- Title: ALGERIA: Police disperse a protest against Algerian president
- Date: 17th April 2014
- Summary: ALGIERS, ALGERIA (APRIL 16, 2014) (REUTERS) POLICE BEING DISPATCHED TO A STREET VARIOUS MEMBERS OF THE BARAKAT ('Enough') MOVEMENT (SOUNDBITE) (French) MASSI, MEMBER OF BARAKAT MOVEMENT, SAYING: "We organised this action to say that we denounce and reject this electoral farce and these people who do not allow us to express ourselves in our own country. Although you can see that we are people demonstrating peacefully and that we are not calling for a revolution, we are not calling to provoke problems that would be harmful to our country. We are peaceful, we are calling for a change and for the freedom of the country." VARIOUS OF POLICE ARRESTING DEMONSTRATORS POLICE PUSHING DEMONSTRATORS AND SURROUNDING THEM MORE OF DEMONSTRATORS. VARIOUS OF POLICE ARRESTING DEMONSTRATORS. VARIOUS OF POLICE ARRESTING WOMEN DEMONSTRATORS SINGING SLOGANS. VARIOUS OF POLICE SURROUNDING DEMONSTRATORS / BLOCKING ROADS
- Embargoed: 2nd May 2014 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Algeria
- Country: Algeria
- Topics: Politics
- Reuters ID: LVA2W6MGQJIBGWTX2KYCVKASRG4Z
- Story Text: Algerian police broke up a small anti-government protest on Wednesday (April 16), a day before elections when President Abdelaziz Bouteflika appeared set to win a fourth term in office despite still recovering from a stroke.
A small group of demonstrators from the group Barakat or "Enough", tried holding a sit-in chanting in downtown Algiers before uniformed police forcibly dragged them off.
"We organised this action to say that we denounce and reject this electoral farcend these people who do not allow us to express ourselves in our own country," said Massi, a member of the Barakat movement. "We are peaceful, we are calling for a change and for the freedom of the country."
Several small groups of protesters, some waving Algeria's green and white flag, were dispersed by the police.
Anti-government protests are rare in Algeria where the ruling Front de Liberation Nationale or FLN and the army have mostly influenced the North African state's politics since independence from France in 1962.
Several opposition parties, once rivals, have joined forces to call for a boycott against an election they saw unfairly tilted in favour of the FLN and its allies.
Backed by the ruling party, Bouteflika is widely expected to win though he has rarely been seen in public since suffering a stroke last year and did not campaign for himself before the April 17 vote.
Demonstrations in Algiers are still banned since a protest in 2001 in which several people were killed in clashes.
Barakat's initial protests were broken up by the police and members detained. But more recently it has been holding regular protests to criticise Bouteflika's decision to run again. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
- Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2014. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
- Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
