Death sentence for 12 terror suspects in Algeria

A criminal court in Boumerdes province (50 km east of Algeria) Thursday sentenced 12 suspects to death for being involved in a suicide attack on a police station eastern Algeria.

•  Abdelmalek Droudkel leader of the terrorist Salfist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) who was one of the 12 suspects got death penalty in absentia.  
• In January 2008, a car bomb went off at a judicial police station in the town of Thenea in Boumerdes killing 3 people and wounding 25.
• According to the Attorney General, the suspects who belong to a terror network took part in a deal on buying the car bomb from Britain and faking its documents. It was sold to Droudkel and his followers.
• The Attorney General had sought death penalty for all the suspects describing their attack by a “big disaster” in which innocents were killed.
• The car bomb was illegally brought from Britain to Algeria in January 2007 with the help of a customs inspector at the port of Algiers.
• When questioned, the accused suspect denied that he knew the custom inspector saying his dead brother was responsible for bringing the car and faking its documents.