Algeria to pardon or reduce sentences for 3,000 terrorists

Algeria will pardon or reduce sentences for up to 3,000 convicted or suspected terrorists, under a national reconciliation plan approved by referendum.

Under the plan, about 1,000 people convicted on terror-related charges are eligible for presidential pardons, and legal action will be stopped against another 1,200 detained terror suspects, the daily Liberte reported, citing the Justice Ministry.

The measures agreed in September apply only to those who were accused of supporting or financing terrorism, since the reconciliation charter excluded pardons for those convicted of organising, of carrying out, or of complicity in, massacres, bomb attacks and rapes, the newspaper said.

“A death penalty could be reduced to life imprisonment,” the newspaper quoted senior Justice Ministry official Abelkader Sahraoui as saying.