Algeria Designates Two Foreign-Based Political Groups as Terrorist
Algeria on Tuesday designated the Kabylie separatist group (MAK) and religious movement Rachad as terrorist organizations, the presidency announced.
The country's High Security
Council based its decision on “hostile and subversive acts” carried out by the
two foreign-based groups in an attempt to “destabilize the country and damage
its security,” it said in a statement.
In March, an Algiers court issued
international arrest warrants for Rachad co-founder Mohamed Larbi Zitout, 57, a
former Algerian diplomat living in Britain, and three activists accused of
joining the organization.
The group stands accused of
infiltrating and inciting violence within the ranks of the Hirak
anti-government protest movement.
The banned Paris-based Movement
for the Autonomy of Kabylie was accused in April of planning attacks in
Algeria, a charge it denies.
The Defense Ministry is “seriously
deviated by publishing a statement accusing the Kabylie independence movement,
without any evidence, of planning terrorist attacks,” the group stressed.
It was established in wake of the
so-called “Amazigh Spring” in 2001. Algerian authorities accuse it of being a
separatist movement and of being “racist” against Arabs.
On Tuesday, French police arrested MAK chief in exile Ferhat Mhenni in Paris on charges of money laundering. He was released later that day.
