Algeria's state of emergency to be lifted
Algeria, Politics, 7/4/1997

The new military-backed government will end the five-and-a-half-year-old state of emergency this weekend, a newspaper reported on June 3. President Lamine Zeroual promised during recent election campaigning to crush a Muslim insurgency that began in 1992 and which has claimed the lives of more than 60,000 people.

Zeroual will announce the lifting of the decree during a speech on Algerian Independence Day on July 5.

Although that move appears to indicate that the government believes security forces have got fundamentalist rebels on the run following a major offensive in recent weeks, more than 250 people have been killed since the June 5 parliamentary election.

The state of emergency, imposed on February 9, 1992, empowers police and military officials to set up special detention centers, carry out arrests and searches without observing normal legal procedures, and try detainees by military tribunals.

All demonstrations deemed likely to disturb public order are currently banned. And authorities have the power to dissolve municipal councils.

The reported plans to lift the decree come in the wake of promises by the new government to end the bombings and village massacres in which hundreds of people have died in recent months.

Zeroual's National Democratic Rally party easily won the June 5 elections. The insurgency began after the army canceled legislative elections in January 1992 that Muslim fundamentalist parties were poised to win.

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