ALGIERS: Algeria’s state prosecutor on Thursday ordered an investigation after a mob lynched a man they accused of sparking the country’s deadly wildfires.
The North African country has been in the grip of devastating fires since Monday that have cost at least 69 lives.
Video footage posted online on Wednesday showed a crowd beating to death 38-year-old Jamal Ben Ismail and setting him ablaze.
They alleged he had started the fires.
The grisly murder was staged in Larbaa Nath Irathen, in the Tizi Ouzou district, one of the worst hit by the fires.
Those responsible “will receive a severe punishment,” the prosecutor said, adding that “odious crimes should not remain unpunished.”
Amnesty International called on authorities to investigate Ben Ismail’s death, which the Algerian League for the Defence of Human Rights branded as “barbaric and atrocious.”
“Scenes of the lynching and torching of the suspected arsonist — a young artist who had come to help put out the fires — are shocking,” the Algerian group said.
Ben Ismail’s father, quoted by local media, called for “calm” as he urged the authorities to “shed light” on his son’s death.
Blazes raged across northern Algeria on Thursday as the country observed a national day of mourning for dozens of people killed in the latest wildfires to sweep the Mediterranean.
Soldiers and civilian volunteers have joined firefighters on multiple fronts in the effort to extinguish the blazes that have been fanned by windy and tinder-dry conditions.
In Tizi Ouzou district, the area with the highest casualty toll, an AFP journalist reported entire sectors of forest going up in smoke.
Villagers forced to evacuate in order to escape the flames began trickling back to their homes, overwhelmed by the scale of the damage.
“I have nothing left. My workshop, my car, my flat. Even the tiles were destroyed,” one of them said.
But he said he had “managed to save his family,” while adding that “neighbors died or lost their relatives.”
Flags were flying at half-mast after President Abdelmadjid Tebboune declared three days of national mourning starting from Thursday.
Algeria probes lynching of arson suspect after deadly fires
https://arab.news/vpj99
Algeria probes lynching of arson suspect after deadly fires
- Video footage posted online on Wednesday showed a crowd beating to death 38-year-old Jamal Ben Ismail and setting him ablaze
Pakistan expresses solidarity with Canada as school shooting claims 9 lives
- At least 9 dead, 27 wounded in shooting incident at secondary school, residence in British Columbia on Tuesday
- Officials say the shooter was found dead with an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound after the incident
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Wednesday expressed solidarity with Canada as a high school shooting incident in a British Columbia town left at least nine dead, more than 20 others injured.
Six people were found at the Tumbler Ridge Secondary School while a seventh died on the way to the hospital, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) said in a statement on Tuesday. Two other people were found dead at a home that police believe is connected to the shooting at the school. A total of 27 people were wounded in the attack.
In an initial emergency alert, police described the suspect as a “female in a dress with brown hair,” with officials saying she was found dead with an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound.
“Saddened by the tragic shooting in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia,” Sharif wrote on social media platform X.
He conveyed his condolences to the families of the victims, wishing a swift recovery to those injured in the attack.
“Pakistan stands in solidarity with the people and Government of Canada in this difficult time,” he added.
Canadian police have not yet released any information about the age of the shooter or the victims.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said he was “devastated” by the violence, announcing he had suspended plans to travel to the Munich Security Conference on Wednesday.
While mass shootings are rare in Canada, last April, a vehicle attack that targeted a Filipino cultural festival in Vancouver killed 11 people.
British Columbia Premier David Eby called the latest violence “unimaginable.”
Nina Krieger, British Columbia’s minister of public safety, described it as one of the “worst mass shootings” in Canada’s history.
