Thousands march to honor high school student killed a year ago at Algerian police station

Thu Apr 18, 5:29 PM ET

BENI DOUALA, Algeria - Several thousand Algerians, many carrying flowers and singing, paid homage Thursday to a high school student who was killed at a police station a year earlier, sparking a wave of deadly riots in the country's ethnic Berber region.


Demonstrators trekked to the marble tomb of Massinissa Guermah, who was shot to death at a police station on April 18, 2001 in Beni Douala, some 120 kilometers (75 miles) east of the capital, Algiers.

Police said Massinissa died after an officer's gun went off accidentally, but that version was roundly contested by the Berber population. His death led to massive riots in the Kabyle region last spring that left at least 60 people dead and 2,000 injured.

Mourners walked about 5 kilometers (3 miles) to the tomb, many with their faces painted in the red, yellow and green colors of the Kabyle region — home to Algeria's Berber minority. A large portrait of Massinissa was put up behind the tomb.

Massinissa's father honored the victims of the "black spring" — as the uprising is known — and said citizens had succeeded in their protest against the government.

"The assassin government has killed defenseless citizens," Khaled Guermah told the crowd. "But a citizens' movement has broken the wall of fear and silence."

Since the riots, sporadic violence has continued as militant Berbers keep up their protest against the government of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika. They have called for a boycott of legislative elections on May 30.

The demonstration took place peacefully and no security forces were on hand.

Organizers were to hold a similar rally in the regional capital of Tizi Ouzou on Saturday to mark the first uprising last year after Massinissa's death.

Berbers claim to be the original inhabitants of Muslim North Africa and have had strained relations with Algerian authorities for decades.

The Berber protests are not directly related to an Islamic insurgency raging in Algeria since 1992. That uprising began after the army canceled elections that a fundamentalist party appeared set to win. More than 120,000 people have been killed since then.

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