afrol News, 6 August - Al-Qaeda's North Africa wing has claimed bomb blast in Tizi Ouzou which injured 25 people on Sunday.

According to statement posted to the web today, Al-Qaeda said it was behind a deadly suicide bombing in Algeria over last weekend.

A car bomb exploded near a police station in town of Tizi Ouzou, which is largest city in eastern Berber-speaking province of Kabylie. An explosion is reported to have dug a big crater an a road beside police station and damaged nearby buildings and also destroyed a dozen of cars which were parked nearby.

"We tell sons of France slaves of America and their masters that our finger is on the trigger and convoys of martyrs are longing to charge your bastions in Defence of our Islamic nation," Al Qaeda said in statement on Islamist website.

It also claimed an attack on 23 July, in which police said a suicide bomber on a motorbike blew himself up and injured 13 Algerian soldiers in Lakhdaria, also east of Algiers.

"Our fingers are on the triggers the caravans of martyrs long to crush your fortifications in Defence of our Muslim ummah (nation)," the statement said, according to Site Intelligence Group.

The group also posted a picture of Abu Mariam, who appeared to be in his 20s wearing a green turban, holding a pistol in one hand, a grenade in the other with three assault rifles nearby.

Report indicates that Al Qaeda's reach extends beyond Algeria as well. In April, United States officials said they feared that Al Qaeda may be expanding across Africa.

Sunday's bombing in Tizi Ouzou underlines Algeria's inability to effectively stamp out terrorism, despite Algerian security services having improved their counter-terrorism tactics since the 1990s.

Algeria is emerging from more than a decade of conflict that began in 1992 when military backed government to scrap elections, a radical Islamic party was poised to win and 150 000 people died during ensuing violence.

In June, a French engineer and his Algerian driver were killed in a bomb attack in the same area that was also claimed by the group.

The bloodshed has subsided in recent years, and in 2006 government freed more than 2 000 former Islamist guerrillas under an amnesty designed to put an end to conflict.

By staff writer

© afrol News

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