ALGERIANS OBSERVE WEEKENDS ON FRIDAY AND SATURDAY FOR THE FIRST TIME

Algeria’s government has decided to break with the 33-year-old practice of observing the weekend on Thursdays and Fridays, a move investors greeted as a step to improving the difficult business climate.

Algeria is a major exporter of oil and gas but outside its energy sector, growth and investment have been modest. Business people blame heavy state regulation that makes it tough to trade with the outside world.

The Algerian cabinet ruled that starting from next month the official weekend would be moved to Friday and Saturday — in line with the practice in many Middle Eastern states.

“It’s excellent news. It will reconnect Algeria with the world,” said Lyes Kahouadji, a financial specialist at Algerian consultancy Strategica, part-owned by Deutsche Bank Group.

Investors complain that having the weekend on Thursdays and Fridays, with Saturdays and Sundays as working days, meant they only had three days a week to conduct business with partners outside Algeria.

The practice had been costing Algeria between $500 and $700 million in lost business each year, according to estimates from business lobby groups.

Saudi Arabia and Yemen also mark the weekend on Thursday and Friday. Kuwait switched to a Friday-Saturday weekend two years ago as part of efforts to promote its non-oil economy.

Friday is a day off in large parts of the Muslim world to allow people to attend prayers at the mosque.

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RAI STAR UNDER TRIAL FOR FORCED FRENCH ABORTION

Algerian singer Cheb Mami is to stand trial in France over allegations that he forced a former partner to undergo an attempted abortion. Cheb Mami, whose real name is Mohammed Khalifati, was arrested at Orly airport in Paris on Monday.

The singer, 42, is credited with bringing Algeria’s popular Rai music to an international audience. He faces 10 years in prison if convicted of complicity in violence but has denied the charges. Prosecutors at Thursday’s trial in Bobigny will allege that Cheb Rami was one of a group who abducted and beat the woman, a French photographer, in the Algerian capital, Algiers, in 2005.

The woman was allegedly forced to undergo an abortion, but on returning to France she discovered she was still pregnant and later gave birth to a daughter. France issued an international arrest warrant for Cheb Mami after he skipped bail in Paris in May 2007 and fled to Algeria.

He denies any involvement in the alleged abortion and says he is being persecuted because he is a successful Arab star. His former manager, Maurice Levy, is also under investigation along with two former aides.

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ALGERIAN MILITANTS KILL 9 SOLDIERS

Islamist militants in Algeria ambushed and shot dead nine soldiers, newspapers reported on Wednesday.

Seven soldiers were also wounded in the attack by at least 30 militants in Biskra province, some 550 km (342 miles) east of the capital Algiers, the El Khabar, Echorouk and El Watan newspapers said.

One rebel was killed, the newspapers said, quoting local sources. No confirmation of the attack was immediately available and there was no claim of responsibility.

A week ago, five paramilitary police were killed in an ambush in the province of Medea, 100 km east of Algiers.

Al Qaeda’s North African wing, known as al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, has been behind a series of bomb attacks and ambushes in the North African country, which is emerging from a civil conflict that broke out in the 1990s.

In the past few years, the group’s ability to carry out major attacks has been weakened by the death or capture of leading militants and government amnesties.

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ALGERIAN EX-MILITANT URGES AL-QAEDA TO SURRENDER

A former leader of Algeria’s Islamist insurgency has urged members of al Qaeda’s North African wing to lay down their arms, in what security experts said was part of a government strategy to split the insurgents. Algeria’s leaders are keen to draw a line under an insurgency that has troubled the North African oil and gas producer for nearly two decades.

A security crackdown has led to a sharp drop in attacks and the authorities are now trying to drive home their advantage by persuading waverers inside al Qaeda’s ranks to accept a long-standing amnesty offer, observers say. An appeal to the insurgents from Amari Saifi, previously a senior figure in the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat — the precursor to al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) — was published on Saturday in several newspapers.

“Armed action brought pain and suffering to our people … the truth is that such actions have nothing to do with Islam,” Saifi, also known as Abderazak El Para, said in the appeal. The former militant, who masterminded the 2003 kidnapping of 32 European tourists, has never previously made a public appeal to the insurgents to surrender.

In the past month similar statements have been issued by Hassan Hattab, who founded the Group for Salafist Preaching and Combat, and by former AQIM propaganda chief Ben Messaoud Abdelkader. A senior Muslim cleric who has offered to mediate between the government and insurgents said the appeals were aimed at a category of al Qaeda militants in the middle ground between the hardliners and former fighters who turned themselves in.

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ALGERIA AND MALI IN JOINT OPERATION AGAINST AL-QAEDA

Algeria has begun sending military equipment to Mali in preparation for a joint operation against Islamic militants linked to al-Qaeda. The aid includes fuel, weapons and sleeping bags, according to reports in the Algerian media. The operation could involve neighbouring countries Niger and Mauritania, say the reports.

Malian President Amadou Toumani Toure has called for regional co-operation to deal with al-Qaeda linked groups. The move follows a recent visit to Algeria by Mali’s defence minister, during which he had talks with President Abdelaziz Bouteflika.

Two independent newspapers have reported that the operation could start within the next month or two and last for six months. Islamist groups have been using the Sahara in northern Mali as a base for attacks in Algeria and for keeping Western hostages.

A group called al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb has threatened to kill a British hostage, believed to be held somewhere in the Sahara region, on 15 May unless the UK frees a detained Jordanian Islamist. The group has been waging a campaign of bombings and shootings, primarily along Algeria’s Mediterranean coast.

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ALGERIA’S PLANS FUTURE WITH EXCESS OIL PROFITS

Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika should use surplus oil and gas revenues to improve life for a younger generation that has grown tired of political speeches, a government minister and Bouteflika ally said. Bouteflika launched a bid for a third term in office last week and promised to spend $150 billion to help a country still struggling to recover from a brutal civil conflict in the 1990s.

Successive amnesties have led thousands of Islamist rebels to disarm and the government has been upgrading infrastructure, building hospitals and schools and improving housing. But analysts say it will be hard to defeat remaining al Qaeda-aligned rebels and press ahead with national development unless the government re-connects with an alienated younger generation that sees it as self-serving and aloof.

Algerian officials say poverty does not produce terrorism.”Little has been done to improve daily life conditions for the young,” said Bouguerra Soltani, minister of state and head of the Society Movement for Peace (MSP), a government coalition partner which is backing Bouteflika’s re-election bid. “This is why the period 2009-2014 should be dedicated to the young,” he told Reuters in an interview late on Wednesday.

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ALGERIAN ISLAMISTS KILL 8 SOLDIERS

Islamic militants killed eight Algerian soldiers in two separate attacks on Sunday, days after seven people died in roadside bombs, an Algerian newspaper reported on Monday.

Rebels detonated a bomb as a military truck passed through Stah Aftis village near the border town of Tebessa, 700 km (435 miles) east of Algiers, killing five soldiers and wounding four, daily El Khabar quoted an unnamed local source as saying.

Three soldiers were also shot dead by Islamic militants at an impromptu checkpoint in Bordj Menail in Boumerdes region just east of the capital, an Al Qaeda stronghold, the paper said.

The off-duty soldiers were in civilian clothing and riding a bus when it was stopped by Islamist rebels disguised as soldiers, said El Khabar. The rebels ordered everyone off the bus for what they said was a routine check.

When one of the soldiers told them “we are your colleagues”, the militants shot them dead on the spot, the Arabic language daily cited an unnamed source as saying.

The attacks bring to 15 the number of people reported killed by Islamist rebels since February 12, when President Abdelaziz Bouteflika said he would stand in elections to seek a third term in office. They also follow a period of relative calm.

Al Qaeda’s north African wing, formerly known as the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), has claimed responsibility for a string of bombings and attacks in the OPEC member country in recent years.

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UN STAFF FACES DISCIPLINARY ACTION OVER ALGIERS SECURITY LAPSES

A report on security lapses before the 2007 bombing of U.N. offices in Algiers recommends reprimands or disciplinary action against 12 U.N. employees, a U.N. investigator said on Wednesday. The car bombing, which has been claimed by al Qaeda’s North Africa wing, killed 17 U.N. staff and raised questions about security of U.N. operations around the world.

The report said there were “significant lapses in judgment and performance,” a lack of supervision by senior managers preoccupied with Iraq and other countries and a badly designed security system subject to politicization. Britain’s David Veness, who was under-secretary-general for safety and security at the time, resigned in June after an earlier inquiry criticized failures in his department.

Ralph Zacklin, who headed a separate panel charged with assigning blame for lapses contributing to the attack, said the panel recommended administrative measures — which could be as little as a letter of reprimand — against six individuals. Four more could face more serious disciplinary action, he said.

“There were significant lapses in judgment and performance on the part of those involved,” a summary of the report said, pointing to a lack of supervision by senior managers who were preoccupied with Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Somalia and Sudan.”Algeria was not on the radar screen,” it said.

Zacklin said it would be for Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to decide exactly what action the 12 individuals would face.”It’s for him to look at our report, decide whether or not he wishes to follow our recommendations,” Zacklin told a news conference. “He has the discretion to do that.”

Zacklin said the five-member panel also recommended assigning collective responsibility to the security management team in Algiers, a body which includes representatives from all U.N. agencies on the ground and which was supposed to coordinate Security measure in the field.

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3 KILLED, 6 INJURED IN ALGIERS BLAST

A suicide attack east of the Algerian capital, Algiers, has killed three people and injured another six, the state news agency has reported. The attack took place at Dellys, about 100km (60 miles) east of Algiers on Sunday, APS news agency said.

Reports said a suicide car bomber hit a checkpoint there at the end of iftar, the meal that breaks the fast during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Algeria has suffered regular suicide attacks by rebels linked to al-Qaeda.

Sunday’s bombing was the first reported since attacks on 19 and 20 of August killed dozens of people east and south-east of Algiers. There was no immediate claim of responsibility.

The bombing of a barracks in Dellys in September 2007 killed at least 28 people and injured a further 60.

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RICE ROUNDS OFF VISIT TO NORTH AFRICA

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said she discussed terrorism and political reform in North Africa during talks with officials in Morocco. She also said Morocco’s long-running struggle with the Polisario Front insurgents in Western Sahara should be resolved quickly.

The Polisario Front wants independence while Morocco has proposed autonomy. The Moroccan capital Rabat was her final stop in a North Africa tour that included a historic visit to Libya. Ms Rice also stopped in Tunisia and Algeria.

“It is quite clear that there are problems of terrorism and need for counter-terrorism co-operation,” between North African states and with the US, she said at a news conference after meeting Moroccan Foreign Minister Taieb Fassi-Fihri.

She also said they had discussed “the process of reform” in Morocco and the other countries she had visited. Morocco says it has broken up more than 30 cells sending fighters to Iraq in the last five years, and the US and North African governments believe there is a growing threat from religious extremists in the region.

In neighbouring Algeria, about 60 people were killed in several attacks which took place within days of each other in August.

Morocco sees the disputed Western Sahara as its southern provinces while others see it as an independent state under Moroccan occupation. The impasse has strained relations between Morocco and Algeria, which supports the Polisario Front.

Ms Rice said the US supports the UN effort to mediate a solution. Resolving the conflict would allow Algeria and Morocco to improve co-operation on security and counter-terrorism, she said.

Morocco is a relatively liberal Muslim kingdom with a long history of good relations with the US.

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