Posted on 02/10/2002 10:33:08 AM PST by Wallaby
Not for commercial use. Solely to be used for the educational purposes of research and open discussion.
Algeria's hardline GIA exacts swift revenge for killing of leader Agence France Presse February 10, 2002 Sunday 9:48 AM Eastern Time ALGIERS, Feb 10
A lgeria's extremist Armed Islamic Group (GIA) has exacted quick revenge for the killing of its leader Antar Zouabri, massacring six family members in a hamlet near Algiers, in a sign it would press ahead with its brutal armed campaign.
Officials said the revenge attack took place Saturday in Bougara, in the Mitidja plain some 35 kilometers (20 miles) south of the capital, the day after Algerian security forces killed Zouabri, who was 31
"The elimination of Antar Zouabri is a turning point in the bloody history of terrorism. But we have to look at the evidence. Even beheaded the terrorist hydra will continue," said Le Soir d'Algerie.
The GIA is one of two main extremist groups still active in Algeria's brutal civil war and accused of appalling atrocities against civilians. Zouabri, who had led the GIA since 1996, was killed late Friday along with two other GIA members in the town of Boufarik, not far from the site of Saturday's massacre, officials said.
The GIA and the Group for Salafist Preaching and Combat (GSPC) are blamed for frequent atrocities against Algeria's civilian population, in a decade of violence which has cost more than 150,000 lives. Saturday's massacre carried out by a four-member gang was a stark reminder that even without Zouabri, blamed for some of the bloodiest massacres, the GIA remains a dangerous movement.
"This is the response to what happened on Friday," said one local official at the funeral of the six massacre victims.
Zouabri's death was hailed as a success for the security forces, faced with an upsurge in violence as Algeria prepares for legislative elections, due to be held by June.
Algeria's newspapers devoted their front pages to the slaying of the 31-year-old GIA leader and debated the group's future without him. "The elimination of Antar Zouabri is a turning point in the bloody history of terrorism. But we have to look at the evidence. Even beheaded the terrorist hydra will continue," said Le Soir d'Algerie.
"But should we be crying victory when we know full well that Antar Zouabri is the GIA's seventh terrorist leader and that this terrorist organisation has not been weakened?" asked the daily Le Matin. "On the contrary, it redoubles its barbarism each time one of its leaders is eliminated."
Since the beginning of the year more than 210 people, including some 60 armed Islamic extremists, have died in Algeria.
The GIA and GSPC rejected an offer of amnesty put forward in 1999 by President Abdelaziz Bouteflika as part of a national reconciliation programme.
The report of Zouabri's death comes exactly 10 years after the country's military-backed government declared a state of emergency, a move considered as the start of its bloody civil war.
The state of emergency, introduced on February 9, 1992, signalled a crackdown on Islamic militants who had reacted violently after the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) was prevented from winning elections the previous month.
The restrictions, which gave the army police powers, were initially set to last a year at the most. They have been renewed each year as the civil war has continued unabated, with civilians accounting for the bulk of the deaths.
Zouabri, considered the most extremist leader of an armed Islamic group in Algeria, succeeded Djamel Zitouni at the head of the GIA after the latter was killed in factional fighting within the group in July 1996.
Zouabri's leadership of the GIA was marked by large-scale massacres, particularly in Rais and Bentalha, in the Mititdja region, where hundreds of people died in bloody GIA attacks in 1997.
The authorities in Algiers blame the GIA for the indiscriminate slaughter of civilians and members of Algeria's security forces. The GIA has justified the slayings with a fatwa, or religious edict, that says Algerians who do not back the GIA in its fight to overthrow the government are renegades.
The era of colonialism has drawn to a close, let the fun and games begin...
Owl _ Eagle
“Guns before butter.”
They got tired of fighting!
Answered wrong, it seems they are still fighting there:
Issue No.4, Vol. VIII, 9 January 2002:
FAA push on Savimbi's last stand
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As a result, Jasmin Mulashusic and Nustret Jusovovic, two Bosnian nationals who travelled regularly between Luxembourg and Brussels, were arrested last month after being shadowed for some time by a specialized team of Belgian gendarmes (POSA) and the Belgian Surete who were working smoothly together for once. The Belgians wanted to keep the two under surveillance for several weeks but examining magistrate Jean-Marc Connerotte feared they might trigger attacks and decided to round them up immediately instead. He also issued an arrest warrant against Ali el Majda, alias Mohamed, a member of the Zaoui network who stood trial at the same time as the latter in September of last year and, like Zaoui, was acquitted. Acting on the warrant, the Belgian gendarmery's Cellule Anti-terroriste (Cel-Ter) arrested el Majda who confessed he was still operating on behalf of GIA and that it was he who had thrown the grenade at the gendarmes in December. Elsewhere, information gleaned by the Luxembourg and Belgian security services (mainly address books) enabled Holland's BVD in early April to team up with Rotterdam police to raid a residence known to house fundamentalists. One of them, a certain Nourredine, alias El Habes and alias Kamal Merabet, is reported to be a major figure in GIA's infrastructure in Europe. Belgium is expected to quickly call for his extradition. In addition, another Bosnian whose identity has been kept secret (he is thought to be named Ratsilovic) was arrested at Shifflange by the Luxembourg gendarmery on April 9. He was hiding in a false ceiling alongside a big cache of ammunition (24,000 bullets) and several Kalashnikovs from the same series as those seized from associates of Zaoui. Belgian investigators believe the arrest broke up one of the GIA's biggest arms networks in Europe. The operation could have repercussions in several European countries, particularly Germany. |
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