New arrests in western Algeria
For suspicions related to fighting in Iraq
New arrests in western Algeria
El Khabar, 27 July 2006
A series of arrests among people suspected of “wanting” to go to fight in Iraq is carrying on in the wilaya of Tiaret (340 km southeast of Algiers), where new arrests were recorded. The families of the four arrests, apprehended between March and June 2006, they know nothing about their relatives since they were arrested. The arrests were however not clearly founded.
The families of the four arrested told us, via telephone, that they do not now where their relatives are incarcerated. They added the arrest took place after investigations made by security services on contacts they would have undertaken with a network recruiting fighters for Iraqi resistance.
The lawyer of some of the blamed, Amin Sidhoum, has denounced “the non respect of the article 51 of penal procedures code which stipulates that custody should not exceed 12 days”, underlining moreover the non respect of the right of the blamed rights to contact their families. The lawyer notes that the procedures on which they were arrested are “contrary to human rights international conventions that Algeria, itself, has signed”.
That wave of arrest taking place in Tiaret, clearly indicates that security services suspected the concerned of links with a network recruiting fighters to be sent to Iraq in the wilaya. Over 20 people were thus arrested; they are incarcerated in the penitentiaries of Serkadji and El Harrach (both of them are in Algiers). The accusations are still ambiguous: are they prosecuted for charges relating to international terrorism? Would they benefit from the provisions of national reconciliation?
Security sources point out that several Algerians having fighted in Iraq were arrested were apprehended as they came back to Algeria, and are submitted to investigations. Security services confiscated their passports and the concerned were not allowed to get new passports, two of them told El Khabar.
2006-07-27
By Hamid Yes
