Bombs hit Algeria police stations - residents

ALGIERS, Feb 13 (Reuters) Bombs exploded near at least three Algerian police stations east of the capital Algiers early today in apparently coordinated attacks, residents said.

There was no immediate word on casualties. A police official contacted by telephone said officers authorised to speak to the media were not immediately available.

Residents said the police stations were in Draa Benkheda and Meklaa in Tizi Ouzou district, while a third was near Tizi Ouzou town. They said there were unconfirmed reports the bombs were rigged in vehicles and set off remotely.

Residents near the town of Boumerdes, 50 km east of Algiers, said they were checking reports of a fourth bomb attack on a police station close to the town.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the reported attacks but residents said they suspected Islamist rebels who have consistently refused peace overtures from the government.

Islamists began an armed revolt in 1992 after the then military-backed authorities, fearing an Iran-style revolution, scrapped a parliamentary election that an Islamist political party, the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), was set to win.

Up to 200,000 people were killed in the ensuing bloodshed.

The violence has sharply subsided in the past few years.

The Tizi Ouzou and Boumerdes districts east of Algiers are often the scene of clashes between Islamist guerrillas and security forces in the oil-and-gas-exporting Mediterranean country.

The reported attacks were the first on police stations since near-simultaneous truck bombs exploded at two police stations on October 30 in the Algiers region, killing three people and wounding 24.

On December 10 a bomb exploded beside a bus carrying foreign oil workers in an upscale Algiers suburb, killing two people and wounding eight.

That attack was claimed by the al Qaeda-aligned Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), the main rebel group fighting to install a purist Islamic rule.

It said last month it was adopting the name Al Qaeda Organisation in the Islamic Maghreb.

Some security analysts believe the GSPC wants to transform itself from a domestic movement in Algeria, where it is under pressure from security forces, into an international militant force capable of striking in both North Africa and in Europe.

REUTERS DKA VV1554