The Organization of Young Free Algerians (OJAL, French: Organisation des jeunes Algériens libres) was a pro-government armed group that claimed credit for various attacks against civilians who sympathised with the Islamists during the Algerian Civil War. It was active mainly in 1994 and 1995. However, some claims and speculations allege that it was a front organizations under which elements of the DRS, the Algerian security services, operated. OJAL never existed as an independent organisation.

Acts for which OJAL took credit

  • The abduction (on 26 November 1993) and killing of Mohamed Bouslimani, president of the Islamic charity El Irshad wa el Islah and founding member of HMS. This abduction was also claimed by the GIA.
  • The kidnapping and torture of Islamic Salvation Front (FIS - then dissolved) founding member and mathematician Mohamed Tedjini Boudjelkha in November 1993; he was released after 5 days.
  • The threat in February 1994 that "If a woman is attacked for not wearing a chador, OJAL will take vengeance by purely and simply liquidating 20 women wearing a hijab."

Testimony from a former DRS agent

According to Aggoun and Rivoire (2004), OJAL was a name that was made up by a group within the DRS, the Algerian security service:

<blockquote> "In September 2001, the ex-adjudant Abdelkader Tigha, sub-officer of the DRS who had deserted at the end of 1999, revealed that the acronym OJAL had been invented by the right-hand man of the CTRI ( / Territorial Research and Investigation Centre) of Blida, Captain Abdelhafid Allouache ..., and that it was subsequently used by other departments of the DRS as a cover in order to murder enemies with impunity."</blockquote>

Police forces were put in 1993 under the authority of the CTRI security services. "Nothing changed from 1993 to 1997" continued Tigha, executions followed arrests. According to Tigha, the police and military were “well aware of what was going on” and their job was to “collect and bury the corpses," on which the acronym OJAL was written. The organization had also posted false flyers to accredit its existence, which was allegedly only a useful cover to dissimulate the acts committed by the counter-insurgency.

The heads of the DRS, Mohamed Médiène and Lamari Smain, decided to create groups of "Patriots" which they armed in order to fight the Islamists. Head of the Armed Forces, Mohamed Lamari (no family ties with Lamari Smain), decided in 1997 to change their names to GLD (', Legitime Defense Groups), allegedly because of fears of prosecution by international courts. According to Tigha, these armed civilians were ordered to kill whole families of targeted Islamists, creating a cycle of vengeance, and to protect wealthy families and homes. They were under complete protection of the security forces. Hence, those responsible for the murder of GIA's emir Antar Zouabri's family were protected by the DRS according to Tigha's testimony.

Aggoun and Rivoire (2004)

Aggoun and Rivoire continue:

<blockquote> According to the media, these groups are made up of young citizens who feel the need to eradicate all forms of Islam from Algeria. To the Algerians who lived through the Independence War, the mysterious acronym OJAL reminds them of the Organization of the French Algerian Resistance (ORAF), a group of counter-terrorists created in December 1956 by the DST / Territorial Surveillance Directorate) whose mission was to carry out terrorist attacks with the aim of quashing any hopes of political compromise. Since its creation, the OJAL appears to work in the same way as the ORAF, the Triple A or Mano Negra<!--Nothing on the Spanish DAB page--> – the South American equivalents which operated during the 1970s.

See also

  • Algeria
  • Politics of Algeria
  • Islamic Salvation Front
  • :Category:Massacres in the Algerian Civil War
  • :Category:Politics of Algeria

References

Bibliography

Has a section called "The Organisation of Young Free Algerians, death squadron of the DRS", an excerpt available at [http://www.algeria-watch.org/en/analyses/ojal.htm]. DRS stands for Département du Renseignement et de la Sécurité, the Algerian secret service.

  • Algeria Watch : an activist web site concerned with human rights
  • Chronology of massacres in Algeria
  • A comment on OJAL on the web site of UNHCR, the UN refugee agency (in French). "The OJAL is a militant group that supported the army in its battle against the Islamists and which perpetrated attacks against the Islamic communities. It was founded in 1993."
  • "Algeria accepts the unacceptable", a 1999 article (in English) in Le Monde diplomatique by Djamel Benramdane.