Copycat protests end with 13 injured in Algeria

RIOT police in the Algerian capital broke up a planned march by hundreds of protesters yesterday who want a law banning public gatherings scrapped. At least 13 people were injured.

Inspired by protests in neighbouring Tunisia, organisers from the country's democratic RCD opposition party draped a Tunisian flag next to an Algerian one on a balcony of their headquarters where the march was to begin.

Riot police ringed the exit to prevent marchers leaving the building.

"I am a prisoner in the party's headquarters," said Said Sadi, a former presidential candidate who leads the Rally for Culture and Democracy party, speaking from a balcony window. The official Algerian news agency said seven police officers were hurt, two seriously. A party spokesman, Mohcine Belabbas, said six party members were injured.

The party's leader in parliament, Atmane Mazouz, was hit in the face with a police baton. Five protesters were detained by police, only to be released later.

Demonstrators shouted "Boutef out!" referring to President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, and echoing cries against Tunisian president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali before he fled on 14 January to Saudi Arabia amid huge street protests in Tunisia.

After the clash with police, a small group of RCD supporters remained outside the headquarters chanting: "The authorities are assassins!" and "A free and democratic Algeria!"

Protesters in countries such as Algeria have set themselves on fire in apparent attempts to copy Mohammed Bouazizi, a 26-year-old Tunisian whose self-immolation helped inspire the protests that brought down Ben Ali.

Algeria's government in 2002 enacted law banning public gatherings, targeting Islamic militants involved in a bloody insurgency that erupted in the country a decade earlier.

The regional government for Algiers denied the RCD's request for permission to demonstrate.