One Week After the Assassination  

   Exactly one week has passed since the assassination of Algerian Head of State, Mohammed Boudiaf.  The military backed government under new Head of State Ali Kafi and Minister of Defense Khaled Nezzar appear to be firmly in control, but the Iranian-backed Islamic fundamentalists behind the killing have vowed not to rest until they have established an Islamic state in Algeria.

   This does not bode well for Algeria.  The outlawed Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) has stated unequivocally that the leadership has a choice:  "To give the word back to the people.. .or to increase the cycle of violence."  Boudiaf's assassination raises fears of increased repression by the ruling High State Committee, and a new infusion of life for the Muslim fundamentalist movement.

   Algeria's Interior Minister Larbi Belkheir has vowed that there will be no dialogue between the government and the FIS.  He said:  "The FIS is a party which has finished, we have dissolved it..."  He added that the government planned to appoint Moslem preachers in each of the country's 9,300 mosques to neutralize fundamentalist rebellion.

   It is clear the ruling committee is firm in its resolve to keep Islamic fundamentalism from creeping into government.  Its new leader, Ali Kafi, is viewed as a hard-line replacement for Boudiaf.  But the decision not to appoint Defense Minister Khaled Nezzar, the committee's strongman, could signal a reprieve from an even more authoritarian stance.

   On Saturday, a six-man team was appointed to investigate the assassination.  It was given 20 days to produce a preliminary report which will be made public.  As the investigators were being sworn-in, two bomb attacks and a shooting occurred in the streets of Algiers.  Later, hooded gunmen shot and wounded a local official in Boufarik, south of Algiers, and a bomb exploded in a newspaper office in the western city of Oran, and another was located in an Air Algerie branch office near Oran's center and detonated in a controlled blast by police.  These incidents illustrate the continued insecurity in the country, and the potential for even more acts of terrorist-style rebellion.

   The Iranian press praised the murder of Boudiaf, and said his successor was headed for the same fate.  Iran branded Algeria's leaders as coup plotters for canceling the general elections in January in which the FIS won the first round of voting, and called on the leadership to respect the will of the people and accept the election results.