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France Under Pressure For Disregarding Algerian Government Carnage
WASHINGTON & PARIS, Feb 13 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Pressure on France to question alleged official human rights abuses in Algeria intensified as intellectuals and politicians say Paris is turning a blind eye to government atrocities in its former colony.
The call on Paris comes as a former Algerian army officer who fled to France after accusing his colleagues of massacring civilians said Tuesday he would return to testify if an international commission of inquiry was set up.
But Habib Souaidia, who published his allegations in a book called "The Dirty War", told French public radio that he doubted such a commission could be formed, and accused the West of turning a blind eye to the killings, news agencies reported.
The Dirty War was recently published in Paris on February 8th, just in time to mark a visit Tuesday by French Foreign Minister Hubert Védrine to the Algerian capital. Védrine is expected to raise allegations about the involvement of the Algerian security forces in torturing and killing civilians.
The Italian judge Ferdinando Imposimato, who investigated the assassination of Aldo Moro and the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II, prefaced the Dirty War, a book which re-ignited the Algerian debate in France, a power broker and a main donor to the government in Algeria.
"There has always been a hidden center of power in Algeria," Imposimato writes. "It has acted with extreme cynicism to shape the course of events. It has locked up society, it has liquidated opponents, within and outside the system."
"Everyone is keeping mum," said Souaidia. "I believe the U.S. and French secret services know exactly what is going on. But the Americans profit from the oil wells in Hassi Messaoud [Algeria's largest desert oilfield]. They got what they wanted and now they're keeping quiet."
His book - which alleges that massacres committed by Algeria's so-called armed Islamic militant rebels were more than matched by the military's own atrocities - inspired calls in France for an inquiry. Souaidia claimed that 10 generals had been behind the killings, which were carried out to protect the military's corrupt grip on power.
On the day the book was published, a group of French and Algerian intellectuals and writers called on Paris to review France's policy towards its former colony due to the allegations of atrocities carried out against civilians and Islamists by army personnel.
In the latest violence, more than 30 people were killed over the weekend, including a senior member of an Algerian Islamist group who was an important supporter of the government's peace initiative.
Defecting Algerian soldiers have spoken before of the army's role in massacres and disappearances. But this is the first time an officer has allowed his full name and photograph to appear in print.
Two days after his book was published, the Algerian Securité Militaire interrogated Souaidia's relatives and neighbors in Tebessa, and his brother's shop was ransacked, said the online edition of the Irish Times.
"I've seen colleagues burn a 15 year-old child alive," Souaidia writes in his introduction. "I've seen soldiers massacre civilians and claim their crimes were committed by terrorists. I've seen colonels murder suspects in cold blood. I've seen officers torture Islamists to death. I've seen too many things. I can no longer keep silent."
"They can stay in charge as long as the war continues, as long as nobody asks 'who is killing whom'?" Souaidia said.
Since 1991, a struggle involving the military and Islamists dominated Algerian politics. In that year, a general election won by an Islamic party was annulled, marking the beginning of a bloody campaign that has seen the slaughter of an estimated 100,000 people.
Violence in Algeria has often been blamed on Islamic groups, but recent calls for an interrogation into official government counter-violence has gained momentum.
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