The Al Qaida attack was the bloodiest in the North African state in
2007. The strike, in which at least 11 UN staffers were killed, belied
claims by the Algerian military that Al Qaida has been defeated.
Officials said they were not surprised by the Al Qaida strike. They said
over the last week Algerian authorities foiled at least two car bombings in
the Tizi Ouzou province, about 100 kilometers east of Algiers.
Al Qaida was said to have recruited 80 operatives for suicide and other
lethal missions in Algeria, officials said. They said the organization
received support from a smuggling ring along the border with Morocco.
In Tuesday's attack, one car bomb was detonated between two UN buildings
in the Hydra residential district of Algiers. A second bomb blew up as a bus
full of university students passed the Supreme Court.
Western diplomats said the Al Qaida strike reflected a high degree of
coordination and intelligence. The diplomats said Hydra, which contains
embassies and government ministries, was one of the most protected
neighborhoods of the capital.
Hours after the bombings, the new Al Qaida Organization for the Islamic
Maghreb claimed responsibility. The organization posted photographs of the
bombings on Islamist websites.
Counter-insurgency experts said the Al Qaida Organization for the
Islamic Maghreb — the product of a 2006 merger with the Salafist Brigade
for Combat and Call, or GSPC — has been franchised to virtually every
Arab state in North Africa. They said the networks maintained contact and
coordinated major strikes.
"GSPC has become, as it were, a sort of regional branch of Al Qaida, its
mission being to federate all the radical, Salafist organizations in North
Africa — Moroccan, Libyan and Tunisian — and, at the same time, to provide
logistical support to the Iraqi networks," French counter-insurgency Judge
Jean-Louis Bruguiere said in a recent interview.
