Two Nigerians were among the 35 people killed, officials said, adding that only nine bodies had been identified so far and that the dozens of injured had been sent to three hospitals in and around Algiers. Security officials, fearing such an attack, had set up checkpoints this week on all roads leading into the town, stopping vehicles entering and leaving the Mitidja rural plain's villages and towns, which are known to be a stronghold of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA).
The GIA, along with the armed extremist Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), rejected a reconciliation accord offered by President Abdelaziz Bouteflika after his 1999 election and have moved their armed struggle into the heart of Algiers and its suburbs.
For the past 10 years, Algeria has been wracked by a murderous spate of blood-letting by diehard Moslem fundamentalist guerrillas, directed mainly at the secular regime and costing thousands of civilian lives. The wave of violence began after January 1992, when the army stopped a general election a Moslem fundamentalist party was poised to win. According to official figures it has since claimed more than 100,000 lives. An unofficial toll based on press reports and official statements runs to 150,000 dead.
Algeria achieved independence 40 years ago after a violent insurrection against French rule between 1954 and 1962. Between 200,000 and 400,000 lives were lost in the war, but the National Liberation Front (FLN), which fought French rule and was for years after independence the country's only political party, puts the figure at some 1.5 million.
The 40th Anniversary celebrations were subdued, with no official parade or public ceremony to mark the event. Bouteflika laid a wreath of flowers to commemorate those who died fighting for Algeria's independence at the capital's Martyrs Monument. Most people are preoccupied with worsening economic and social conditions. Foreign investment is almost non-existent, while unemployment officially runs at around 30%. Since independence from France, the Algerian population has soared from 10 million to 31 million, exacerbating social problems and impoverishing a country where an estimated half of the people live below the poverty line.
Economic hardship, corruption and favoritism by officials are a fertile breeding ground for Islamic extremism, as militants feed on discontent to recruit support for their plans to establish a fundamentalist Moslem state.
