January 02. 2008 6:01PM
Algeria Car Bomb Kills 4 Police Officers
By HASSANE MEFTAHI
Associated Press Writer
A man stands by a seriously damaged building in Naciria, in the Boumerdes region, 50 kilometers (31 miles) east of Algiers, Algeria Wednesday, Jan. 2, 2008. Three people were killed and 7 other injured when a large car sped toward a police station and exploded at its doors early Wednesday morning, according to witnesses in a town east of the Algerian capital. The building seen in the picture is not the Naciria police station. (AP Photo/Ouahab Hebbat)
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ALGIERS, Algeria A car bomb exploded near a police station in a town east of the Algerian capital Wednesday, killing at least four officers and injuring 20 people, officials and witnesses said.
The blast followed twin suicide bombings on Dec. 11 at U.N. offices and a government building that killed at least 37 people in the capital of Algiers.
A journalist and another resident in the city of Naciria said the car sped toward the police station and exploded. The two, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared for their safety, said the attack appeared to be a suicide bombing.
The Interior Ministry said the attack killed at least four police officers and injured 20, including eight police officers. The ministry provided no details other than to say that the bombing was near the police station in the town about 45 miles east of Algiers.
The explosion tore off the front of the police station and damaged neighboring buildings. Security forces cordoned off the rubble-strewn ruins.
Security forces have been on maximum alert since earlier this week, after three trucks were stolen in the Algiers region, the newspaper Liberte reported Wednesday. The vehicles included a fuel tanker, and officials fear they might be used in suicide attacks, the report said.
Al-Arabiya satellite TV had reported that al-Qaida's North Africa branch claimed responsibility for the attack, but the claim couldn't immediately be confirmed with officials. The group, known as al-Qaida in Islamic North Africa, emerged from an alliance between Osama bin Laden's international terrorist network and an Algerian Islamist movement known as the Salafist Group for Call and Combat.
The suicide bombings in December and others in April also were claimed by al-Qaida in Islamic North Africa.
Al-Qaida in Islamic North Africa has increasing used vehicles packed with explosives to deliver its strikes. In July, a suicide bomber blew up a truck inside a military barracks southeast of Algiers, killing 10 soldiers. Two months later, at least 28 people died after an explosives-packed vehicle rammed into a coast guard barracks in the northern town of Dellys.
Meanwhile Wednesday, Le Soir newspaper said security forces have detained the mastermind behind the April 11 attacks that hit the Algerian prime minister's office and a police station, killing 33 people.
Police picked up the 28-year-old suspect at his Algiers home overnight Saturday, the report cited an unidentified security official as saying. The official said the suspect chose the targets, recruited the suicide bombers and bought the substances used to make the explosives. It was not clear whether he was implicated in any other attacks, the newspaper said.
Officials with national security forces declined to comment on the report.
Algeria's Islamic insurgency broke out in the early 1990s, when the army canceled the second round of the country's first multiparty elections to prevent likely victory by an Islamic fundamentalist party. Armed groups then turned to force to overthrow the government, and up to 200,000 people were killed in the ensuing violence.
Until recently, the insurgency had been dying down, with militants' ranks dwindling after military crackdowns and amnesty offers. But in late 2006, the main Algerian militant group allied with al-Qaida and began to wage larger-scale bombings and target foreigners - signs that Islamic fighters were regrouping.
A map of Algeria, where the bombing took place.
A police station has been hit by a bomb in , which is in the northern part of Algeria and is about 50 km east of the Algerian capital Algiers.

According to reports, at least 4 people are dead and several are injured. Full details have not yet been released. The bomb went off at about 0600 UTC (7 AM local time) today.

It is currently not clear whether the bombing was caused by a  or a .

The bombing, although less serious than the  which killed 40 people, is likely to raise suspicions that violence has not ended in Algeria. It is the first bombing to hit Algeria since the bombings in early December.

The bombing was announced in a statement by a spokesman for the Algerian Interior Ministry in which the following was said - "There has been an attack with explosives near a police station in Naciria. The attack left three dead and seven wounded." 

Frequent terrorism first hit Algeria after measures were carried out by the government to stop a  party winning the elections. That party has now been banned. 

A witness of the event said that the majority of injuries hit police officers and not the general public.