Justice: Files of Sonatrach, highway and assassination of Ali Tounsi outside the agenda

Criminal session of Algiers Criminal Council will start on November 30, which is devoid of its most important issues that preoccupied the public opinion, as the public prosecutor did not program the case of the death of Colonel Ali Tounsi, in which Colonel Chouaib Oueltache was implicated, and its investigation finished more than two years ago.

Case of East-West Highway was not programmed as well, as the Supreme Court rejected the appeals that were filed against it, and was referred to the Criminal Court, and the same thing for the case of “Sonatrach 1”.

Criminal session, which starts later this month, will last until next March 15, as 165 different criminal cases will be considered, in which 307arrested accused and 107 accused who are not detained and 23 other people in escape will be tried according to the late procedures.

Session’s agenda includes many old deferred issues, as well as issues that returned after the appeal of the Supreme Court, while new and sensitive cases were absent from the table, especially the case of murder of Colonel Ali Tounsi, which investigation was launched since2010.

Investigation ended since more than two years, and no criminal sessions have been programmed last year nor the current session, while the case of suspicious transactions in which the accused of killing Ali Tounsi, Colonel Shouaib Oueltache, and some police officials were brought to trial after Algiers Criminal Council already ended it.

East-West highway and Sonatrach 1 cases are not yet programmed, after the two cases files returned from the Supreme Court, 
which decided transmit the two files to the Criminal Court, and this is what is raised again according to lawyers, the problem of scheduling and the legal vacuum in the time period, in which the file remains in front of the public prosecutor to be scheduled for trial in criminal court, and especially in the sensitive and thorny issues which are often treated amid political conditions that control its scheduling, as happened in the file “Khalifa Bank”, and the same thing for the case of the death of Colonel Ali Tounsi, in which lawyers think that it is a very sensitive case which depends on a political decision to file.