ABSTRACT
The year 2002 marked the tenth anniversary of a military-backed coup that halted the electoral process in Algeria, after a first round of voting had assured the Front Islamique du Salut (FIS) a huge majority in Parliament. In the name of safeguarding democracy from religious extremism, the new military rulers cancelled the second round of voting. Since then, approximately 150,000 people have been killed whilst thousands more have ‘disappeared’. The peak of horror occurred in 1997 when hundreds of villagers were slaughtered in spite of the fact that military barracks were situated close to the place of the massacre. The outcome of the growing revolt against generalised violence was a societal request for knowing ‘qui tue qui’ (who killed who). The political answer to the growing revolt was to call a presidential election in 1999, which was won by former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Abdelaziz Bouteflika. He was the first civilian to become president in the history of Algerian independence (in 1962). Since his coming to power, the annual rate of killings has decreased: ‘only’ 1,900 people were killed in 2001 (www.algeria-interface.com/new/article).
