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| Africa: North |
| 7 Algerian coppers iced in GSPC ambush |
| 2004-02-13 |
| ARMED Islamic extremists last night killed seven Algerian gendarmes and injured three others in an ambush at Toudja in the north-eastern Kabylie region, security officials said. About 50 members of the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) took part in the attack on a mountain road about 30 kilometres west of the Petite Kabylie town of Bejaia, a security source said. They ambushed three vehicles in which the paramilitary police officers were patrolling at around 10.30am, made the attack, seized seven firearms and drove off with their vehicles. The GSPC, led by Hassan Hattab, has stepped up its operations in the Kabylie region of Algeria in the past two weeks, after a period of relative calm around the end of the year, targeting mainly the security forces. It is held by Washington to have links with al-Qaeda and it is the best organised of the extremist groups at war with Algeria’s secular government, with an estimated 400 to 500 members, according to the Algerian army. The GSPC was also blamed for an bomb attack in which two French construction workers and their Algerian police escort escaped largely unscathed in the Lakhadaria region early today. Two explosive charges were detonated from a distance in an attack on a road convoy in a wooded mountain area 70 kilometres south-east of Algiers. One of the Algerian gendarmes was slightly injured in the blasts, which damaged the targeted vehicles in the convoy, an informed source said. The French nationals, who were not named, are workers at a dam building site in a part of the Atlas mountains frequented by armed guerrillas of the Salafist Group. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #5 Kabylie and Lakhadaria... so they're up in the mountains now. Sounds like standard guerilla tactics. Kabylie is an easier area to get supplies from Egypt as well. At least they're not down on the coast. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2004-2-13 2:46:55 PM |
| #4 I guess they're sorta like Jehovah's Witnesses Then treat them like Jehovah's Witnesses and shoot them when they knock on your door. |
| Posted by: Steve 2004-2-13 10:43:43 AM |
| #3 Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat? I guess they're sorta like Jehovah's Witnessesexcept they shoot you if you don't take their magazines. |
| Posted by: Ray 2004-2-13 10:12:23 AM |
| #2 I'd like to second that thanks. Thanks, Mr. Darling! (So much information, so little time...) |
| Posted by: Quana 2004-2-13 8:48:15 AM |
| #1 Dan, first let me thank you for staying on top of all these stories...I do tend to look for your byline. In any case, Algeria has been going on for soooo long now, is this all we have to look forward to Iraq also....just endless years, decades of attacks? When DeGaulle & France left Algeria I thought it was a mistake and would lead to this result. In retrospect, is it better that Algerian gendarmes are being wounded and killed than French? Hummmmm........ |
| Posted by: Traveller 2004-2-13 2:20:27 AM |