Algeria fears return to "nightmare" of 1990s war http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSL1920367320070412
Thu Apr 12, 2007
By William Maclean
ALGIERS (Reuters) - Algerians angered by the worst bombings in years voiced fears on Thursday that the North African oil exporting country may return to the political bloodshed of the 1990s.
"We thought the days of terror were over. I am still shocked. I am afraid," said Mohamed Rabhi, a young student drinking a coffee in a central Algiers street.
Interior Minister Nourredine Yazid Zerhouni said the suicide blasts that killed 33 in the capital on Wednesday may have been designed to disrupt May 17 parliamentary polls and torpedo efforts to put a definite end to years of political violence.
"We shouldn't exclude the possibility that there were also other interests not wanting to see the Algerian state recover, rebuild and work more effectively," he said without elaborating.
The Al Qaeda Organisation in the Islamic Maghreb claimed responsibility for the bombings. The claim could not immediately be verified but the group has taken responsibility for several deadly attacks on police, troops and foreigners since January.
Police threw up extra checkpoints and deployed additional patrols around the Mediterranean port city of 3 million people.
Many voiced fear the blasts might relaunch the chaos of the 1990s, when tens of thousands of Islamist rebels fought security forces in a country the size of western Europe.
"Fear has returned," said a 60-year-old man. "I've asked my youngest brother to pay attention when using public transport. You never know."
Echorouk newspaper reported that a black Mercedes rigged with 500 kg (1,100 pounds) of explosives was defused by police on Wednesday near the house of police chief colonel Ali Tounsi. Police officials were not immediately available for comment.
TOO SOFT ON REBELS?
Some placed indirect blame for Wednesday's carnage on the government, saying it had been too soft on Islamist rebels under what they say is a flawed policy of national reconciliation.
"The terrorists should be put up against a wall and shot. Enough of the hand of peace," said Mohammed, a car mechanic in the city's upscale Hydra district.
Zerhouni told the official APS news agency fighting terrorism depended on Algerians "remaining vigilant, because people have become used to peace." Algeria descended into violence in 1992 after the then military-backed authorities scrapped a parliamentary election which an Islamist political party was set to win. Up to 200,000 people were killed in the ensuing bloodshed.
That violence subsided in recent years following amnesties for insurgents, but rumbles on in mountains east of Algiers.
Other analysts say the upsurge in attacks is paradoxically a sign that army pressure on rebels east of Algiers is working.
"The more the security services near the total eradication of these vermin, the more the terrorists launch desperate actions," wrote the Liberte daily. NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer joined an international chorus of condemnation of the attacks. "There can never be any justification for this violence," he said.
(Additional reporting by Abdelaziz Boumzar in Algiers and Ingrid Melander in Brussels)
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