At long last, the dreadful atrocities in Algeria are attracting extensive international attention and diplomatic concern. The eruption of fresh massacres in the month of Ramadan, in which up to 1,000 people have died in recent days, has led to calls for investigations, mediation or a political response from senior United Nations figures, the US State Department, the European Union and individual European states, Ireland included. It is essential that this pressure be kept on the military-dominated regime, which insists that the atrocities have been perpetrated by Islamic militants and rejects calls for international involvement in the name of its exclusive state sovereignty. In response, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mrs Robinson, has insisted that governments have a duty to care for their citizens and that human rights concerns are universal. The British Foreign Secretary, Mr Robin Cook, assuming the EU presidency role, argues that there is "a legitimate outside interest. This is a matter of concern for the international community". On these grounds, the Algerian government definitely has a case to answer at the bar of international opinion. Many thousands of people have been massacred close to police and army barracks without any intervention to protect them. There are persistent reports that the government itself is responsible for at least some of the massacres - in an attempt to blacken the name of its Islamic opponents - and its record after it suppressed elections six years ago, is replete with reported human rights violations, including torture and summary executions.
It is not a sufficient defence against such charges, that the Islamic groups have been fighting a terrorist war against the secular state and that they are undoubtedly responsible for many of the 60,000 deaths since 1992. Nor that Algeria is a very violent place, which has always fought its wars ferociously, not least during the long French occupation. Nor that the series of elections and referendums held in recent years have restored legitimacy to the regime. This is a complex conflict, whose elements go back to questions unresolved by the Algerian war of independence, including corruption and inequality, military domination, incessant factionalism, discrimination against ethnic minorities and more recently, intensified social discontent with the IMF-sponsored economic restructuring programme and the burden of repaying foreign debts. All these feed into the conflict between the state and its Islamic opponents, who are themselves politically differentiated to a marked degree.
Algeria is rich in oil and gas resources and needs good political relations with the international community. Its government is therefore open to pressure to resolve a conflict which degrades our common humanity. International involvement could range from political dialogue with the government through the EU troika drawing on the diverse experience and interests of EU states with regard to Algeria; discussions with the main Islamic opposition, encouraging it to negotiate with the government; human rights inspections and discussions at the human rights convention in Geneva; and United Nations pressure and resolutions.
If such methods do not shift the Algerian government towards a negotiated settlement, it might be necessary to consider economic, trade or investment sanctions. All such measures stop well short of military intervention, which is quite unrealistic but too often used as an excuse for doing nothing.