Algeria goes high-tech to confront organised crime

20/05/2008

A new Algerian study warns that organised crime is almost as big a threat to the country's security as terrorism. With new DNA labs, crime databases and improved training already showing signs of success, Algerian law officers say they are ready.

By Achira Mammeri for Magharebia in Algiers – 20/05/08

[Getty Images] Algerian forensic experts examine the site of a car bomb in August 2007. Algeria has announced new high-tech measures to counter organised crime.

A new study published on Wednesday (May 14th) by the national gendarmerie says that after terrorism, organised crime is "the main challenge which Algeria has to face". While the report warns that the "persistence of organised crime is a real cause for concern for the security forces", Algerian officials say they are prepared.

According to National Security Director Ali Tounsi, the priority during the "black decade" of civil unrest and bloodshed was to fight terrorism, and all the State’s human and material resources were mobilised to this end. This left "considerable room for organised crime networks".

Not anymore, according to Tounsi. His department is working aggressively to combat both organised and "cyber" crime. Statistics published by the interior minister show that the general level of crime in Algeria ranges from 3 to 5 crimes per 1000 population, making Algeria "safer than Spain, Tunisia or even Mauritania", Tounsi says.

The number of organised crime cases processed by the Algerian legal system, mostly for drug trafficking, immigration and smuggling, has fallen slightly (3,705 cases over the first four months of this year, compared with 3,811 during the same period of 2007).

"The drop, albeit small, in organised crime in 2008 is evidence of the efforts being made on the ground by all elements of the national security forces," said Lieutenant Gheraissia Belbey, who headed up the new study.

The national gendarmerie is highly committed to halting this threat, she added, pointing to the creation in 2007 of the National Criminalistics and Criminology Institute to process "hard evidence such as DNA" and a new national unified data and telecommunications network (RUNITEL) linking all the gendarmerie brigades and providing them with a database on organised crime networks. Gendarmerie officers are also training abroad "under co-operation agreements signed with a number of western countries", she told Magharebia.

Even with the new initiatives and the reported reduction in crime, officials remain vigilant. Minister of the Interior Noureddine Yazid Zerhouni has cited "the close ties which exist between organised crime networks and terrorism".

Studies have indicated that "suicide bombers are acting under the influence of drugs", National Office for the Fight against Drugs and Addiction director Abdelmalek Sayeh noted in recent interviews. Indeed, "security forces seized considerable quantities of drugs from terrorists arrested on the western border," he noted last Thursday.

An electronic surveillance network has already been installed along Algeria’s land borders as part of the fight against crime and smuggling.

Algeria has also toughened up legislation relating to organised crime over the past three years.