An armed gang attacked two villages outside the capital, slaughtering 120 people in a movie theater and in a mosque, hospital sources and survivors said Monday.
Security forces put the number of dead at 103 and said 70 others had been injured, including two soldiers. Authorities have underestimated death tolls since the Muslim insurgency began in January 1992.The two attacks Sunday evening about 10 miles from the capital were the bloodiest in the Algiers region since a series of massacres in August and September that killed hundreds.
Violence has intensified across the nation with the start of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month, on Dec. 30. At least 600 people were reported killed in two waves of attacks in mountain hamlets in western Algeria.
According to medical sources at several Algiers hospitals, 120 people were killed and 100 others injured in the Sunday night attacks in a theater in the village of Sidi Ahmed and in a mosque in Haouche Sahraoui.
In each case, bombs were set off at the start of the slaughter.
The statement by security forces, carried by the state-run APS news agency, said that self-defense groups armed by the government and security forces helped push back the attackers at Sidi Ahmed.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the latest attacks, but suspicion fell on Islamic insurgents whose battle to topple the military-backed government has entered its seventh year.
The radical Armed Islamic Group, known as the GIA, is implanted in the region south of Algiers.
"We know the attackers," said Farid, an adolescent who lost several members of his family. "It's the GIA. They had already threatened us. They said, `We're going to kill you,' and they came."
Farid spoke to The Associated Press on condition he not be further identified.
In an unusual move, Interior Minister Mostefa Benmansour reportedly visited the site of the massacres, newspapers reported.
Algeria's insurgency has killed more than 75,000 people - 1,000 just since the start of Ramadan, a surge in violence that has prompted international calls for an investigation.
In the insurgency's worst single massacre, more than 400 people were reported killed in three villages around the western town of Relizane the night Ramadan started.