Algerian man sentenced to 20 years in prison for espionage

A criminal court in Algiers has sentenced an Algerian psychologist and expert in anti-terrorism to 20 years’ jail in absentia on conviction of spying activities after a murky stay in Iraq where he got in touch with shadoway armed groups.

• Noureddine Benziane had already been sentenced to four years on the same charge on February 1, 2009, and spent two years in prison after already being held for two years in preventive detention.

• He was subsequently released, but the Supreme Court annulled this judgment on appeal by the state prosecution and ruled that the affair must be tried a second time.

• “Twenty years’ jail in absentia for Noureddine Benziane, found guilty of spying in collaboration with a foreign state prejudicial to the national interest,” chief judge Omar Benkherchi ruled Monday.

• The prosecutor had demanded the same sentence in the absence of Benziane who had been evacuated to France after a heart attack, according to his lawyer, Cherif Chorfi.

• According to the charge sheet, Benziane went to Iraq on pseudo humanitarian missions several times between 2005 et 2007 and headed an international delegation of psychologists sent ostensibly to help traumatized Iraqi children.