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Renewed Clashes In Algeria Leave Two Dead
ALGIERS, May 23 (News Agencies) - Renewed clashes between police and youths in Algeria's ethnic Berber region have left two people dead, including a child, press reports and residents said Wednesday.
The fighting between rioting youths and security forces throughout cities around Bejaia in the northeastern Kabylie region has wounded others and damaged public buildings, Radio Soumman announced.
Berber radio did not say how many were wounded, but said the clashes were concentrated in the Bejaia cities of Aokas, Souk el-Thenine and Kherrata, 250 kilometers (155 miles) east of Algiers.
Residents said demonstrators set up roadblocks with tree branches and large rocks, stopping public transportation and commuters between the region's cities.
Unruly groups are looting vehicles stopped at the barricades or forcing passengers to pay money, Radio Soummam reported.
Bejaia was inaccessible Wednesday afternoon, with roads cut off both towards Setif in the east and towards Algiers to the west.
Buses from Algiers remained at a standstill at El Kseur, just west of Bejaia, and nearby Oued Ghir, witnesses said.
About 500 high school students staged a spontaneous walkout Wednesday morning after the government set Kabylie's exit exams for July 28th.
The students, following the advice of the Berber Cultural Movement (MCB), had demanded a second test date be set in September.
The unrest follows a wave of riots that broke out in late April over the killing of a Berber teenager in police custody.
On Wednesday, press reports and residents said a girl, between six and eight years old, died from suffocation after police on Tuesday sprayed tear gas at young protesters in the town of Bakaro.
A man in his 50s also reportedly died of tear gas asphyxiation following clashes between police and youths in Matkaas in the Tizi Ouzou mountains, according to the press.
The violence came a day after more than half a million people marched in Tizi Ouzou in honor of up to 80 people who died during a police crackdown on the riots.
Discontent has simmered in the region over perceived apathy on the part of the central government towards the plight of the Berber minority, who have long complained of cultural and political discrimination.
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