The last words of the Armed Islamic Group's (GIA) most recent diatribe summed up the group's strategy: "Blood, blood! Destruction, destruction!" The words - printed in the Al Ansar newsletter handed out at fundamentalist mosques in London last Friday - quickly found expression on the ground in Algeria, where 24 hours later 11 women school teachers were murdered.
This latest atrocity took place at Ain Adden, near Sidi BelAbbes 370 km south-west of Algiers, according to yesterday's Algiers daily Le Matin. Witnesses said the women were caught at a fake checkpoint as they left school. Their attackers were tying their hands and feet, probably to kidnap them, when a male colleague, alerted by school children, ran towards the gunmen shouting "murderers, murderers". He was shot dead by the rebels, who proceeded to slash the throats of the 11 women in front of watching students.
Elsewhere in Algeria, at least 19 villagers from near Djelfa, 225 km south of the capital, were also slain at the weekend. These latest killings in remote regions of the country totally contradict government claims that the violence has been contained in the "triangle of death" near the capital.
The GIA's communique, bearing the group's seal and signed by its leader, Antar Zouabri - earlier rumoured to have been killed in battle - was authenticated by the French Ministry of the Interior. In it the GIA admitted responsibility for the massacre of more than 200 people in the Algiers suburb of Bentalha last week, saying that it "considers the tyrants [Algerian authorities], their relatives and supporters to be infidels. That is why it tracks down the supporters of the tyrants in the villages and wilderness, eradicates them, destroys their fields, captures their women and confiscates their belongings."
The residents of Bentalha were about to receive weapons from the government to form "self-defence committees" - militias supported by the Algerian army. Some people who escaped from the massacre said the killers cursed their victims for accepting government help.
The fundamentalists must have been tipped off by someone in the security forces that the village was about to be armed. The GIA called the massacres "an offering to God" and said it would accept "no dialogue, no truce and no reconciliation".
As for the Islamic Salvation Army, which earlier announced a ceasefire, the GIA said: "We ask God to give us the upper hand and cut off their heads." France - which was the victim of a GIA aircraft hijacking in 1994 and GIA bombings in 1995 and 1996 - was also threatened: "We have not forgotten and we will not forget the help you have given the infidels and we will not relent in our fight against you," the statement said. On one question only - its rejection of mediation by the UN - did the GIA agree with the Algerian authorities.
The Algerian regime might be expected to concentrate its efforts on fighting the GIA, but it seems to be directing its frustration against the press instead. Yesterday a correspondent for the French news agency AFP had his accreditation withdrawn by the Algerian Foreign Ministry. In its reports on last week's Bentalha massacre, AFP documented the deaths of more than 200 people, while the government claimed "only" 85 had died.
AFP chairman Mr Jean Miot said the move was "an unacceptable attack on the freedom to exercise our profession". Mr Miot has written to the Algerian government expressing his "stupefaction and indignation".
The leading French television network TF1 has also been denied permission to work in Algeria, which also penalises Algerians who rely on satellite dishes for news.
