95 Prisoners Reported Dead in Algeria Uprising

Security forces killed 95 inmates Wednesday in crushing an uprising by Islamic extremists jailed for taking part in a 3-year-old insurgency, authorities said.

Inmates armed with homemade knives and other weapons took seven guards hostage Tuesday and slit the throats of four of them, then began organizing an escape by as many as 1,000 jailed militants and regular prisoners, officials said.

The Justice Ministry said all of the mutineers were Islamic extremists but didn’t say how many regular prisoners were among those killed, if any. It wasn’t known how many inmates were in the Serkadji prison, which is near the Defense Ministry and the headquarters of Algeria’s national paramilitary police.

More than a dozen other prison employees and security forces members were injured, Justice Minister Mohammed Teguia said.

Officials said the dead inmates included two jailed leaders of the Armed Islamic Group, the most hard-line of the guerrilla organizations fighting to overthrow the army-installed government.

The rebellion erupted in 1992 after the army canceled elections that a Muslim party was expected to win. About 30,000 people have been killed in the conflict.

Also killed at the prison Wednesday, the officials said, was Lembarek Boumaarafi, a jailed army officer charged in the 1992 assassination of President Mohammed Boudiaf.

Hundreds of Islamic extremists are being held at the prison, and the initial revolt included about 40 or 50 of them, according to unofficial press reports.