Algiers bomb survivor search ends

Rescue workers today called off the search for survivors at the UN building in Algeria blasted apart by a suicide bomber.

The official death toll stood at 37 from the two car bombs that hit the UN offices and a court complex in the capital Algiers at almost the same moment on Tuesday.

Rescue teams had already stopped combing through the debris of the Algerian Constitutional Council building.

In the first 24 hours after the blasts, claimed by al-Qaida, rescuers found seven survivors in the wreckage.

Victims included UN staff from around the world, police officers and law students.

Marie Heuze, chief spokeswoman for UN offices in Geneva, said the casualty list showed 11 staff died in the attack and five were still missing.

It was the deadliest single attack against UN staff and facilities since August 2003, when its headquarters in Baghdad was hit by a truck laden with explosives. That attack killed 22 people, including the top UN envoy, Sergio Vieira de Mello, and was blamed on a group that later affiliated with al-Qaida.

Algeria’s Islamic insurgency broke out in the early 1990s, when the army cancelled the second round of the country’s first multiparty elections to prevent likely victory by an Islamic fundamentalist party. Islamist armed groups then turned to force to overthrow the government, with up to 200,000 people killed in the ensuing violence.

Until recently, the insurgency had been dying out, with militants’ ranks dwindling after military crackdowns and amnesty offers.

But late last year, the main Algerian militant group – the Salafist Group for Call and Combat – changed its name to al-Qaida in Islamic North Africa and began waging larger-scale bombings.

Insurgents battling Algeria’s government have largely focused on symbols of the military-backed government and civilians. The strike against the UN office signalled a change in tactics.