Suicide bomber kills eight in Algeria

ALGIERS // A suicide bomber rammed a van full of explosives into a police post in eastern Algeria, killing eight people and injuring 19 others, public radio reported today. The attack happened yesterday night at Zemmouri el Bahri, a popular beach with holidaymakers, near Boumerdes, east of the capital Algiers. It came less than a week after a suicide attack on a police station at Tizi Ouzou, in the eastern Kabylie region, which wounded 25 people.

Responsibility for the August 3 attack was claimed by Al Qa'eda's North African branch. The group also claimed an attack on July 23, in which police said a suicide bomber on a motorbike blew himself up and injured 13 Algerian soldiers in Lakhdaria, also east of Algiers. This weekend's latest, deadly blast represents the heaviest toll since two suicide blasts on United Nations buildings in Algiers in December that killed at least 41 people, including 18 UN staffers.

Armed groups in Boumerdes, neighbouring the mountainous wooded region of Kabylie, remain the most active in Algeria. Unofficial sources estimate there are 300 to 400 armed militants in this area, dubbed the "quadrangle of death." Anti-terrorism experts say Algiers, which has been placed under heavy security surveillance, remains the main target of armed groups and that several attacks have been intercepted here.

The recent spate of violence brought to an end a six-month period of relative calm that followed the devastating December bombings. That attack triggered the reinforcement of anti-terrorism and security measures around public buildings, as well as an attempt to clamp down on terrorist networks. Between January and July, Algerian courts handed down 218 death sentences in absentia to armed militants on the run, according to judicial sources.

Twelve militants, including a number of individuals considered among the leaders of Al Qa'eda in the Maghreb, were killed overnight on Thursday into Friday by the army in an ambush near Beni Douala, near Tizi Ouzou, the interior ministry said. Security forces discovered a minor arsenal of weapons including Kalashnikov assault rifles, as well as mobile telephones, the ministry added. *AFP