Up to 200 people were butchered or burnt to death in a brutal massacre south of Algiers overnight, witnesses said yesterday, after the Algerian government insisted that it had terrorism under control.
Officials "categorically" denied witness reports that between 180 and 200 people, mostly women and children, were slaughtered, amid scenes of "unimaginable butchery" in Bentalha, south of the capital.
Instead, officials put the toll at 85 dead and 67 wounded, but that alone would make the killing one of the bloodiest in more than five years of civil war.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia had declared that acts of terrorism - which are routinely blamed on Islamic fundamentalists - had begun to wane as a result of his government's uncompromising line.
Thanks to "increased vigilance of the population, the determination of the security forces and the end of political bargaining", the country now faces only "residual terrorism", Mr Ouyahia asserted in a speech on Algerian television.
Officials said many of those who died in Bentalha had their throats slit or were burned alive as the attackers razed their homes.
Of the 67 people officially said to be wounded, 31 were in a serious condition.
"All the bodies have been lined up on the ground, some of them under blankets. It is unimaginable butchery," a resident said, as the bodies were placed in a school serving temporarily as a morgue.
The government presented its condolences to the relatives of the victims and vowed to continue its battle against "terrorism".
Television footage from the scene showed burned-out houses and men in the street being consoled by the Health Minister, Mr Yahia Guidoum.
A wave of panic swept through the area and traffic jams built up as Algerians rushed towards Bentalha, near the working-class district of Baraki, seeking news of relatives.
Security forces sealed off the area and prevented journalists from reaching Zmirli hospital in Algiers, as survivors began burying their dead yesterday afternoon.
In the attack, which began on Monday evening, the first group of attackers laid mines and traps around the houses. They were joined later by others who set about the killing in earnest.
An old man, still in shock, recalled the scene: "We fled. We could hear screams and bomb explosions."
According to unconfirmed reports, security forces clashed with some of the attackers during the night. Yesterday's security services statement denounced the "act of barbarism" and blamed it on "terrorists," the government's term for armed Islamic extremists.
In a statement issued in Paris, Mr Abdelkrim Ould Adda, a spokesman for the banned Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), condemned the killings "firmly and vehemently".
The massacre comes less than a month after 98 people were shot, slashed and burnt to death, and 120 wounded in the Sidi Moussa district of Algiers, according to a government toll.
However, residents there said the number of dead was between 200 and 300, which, if confirmed, would have made it the most brutal act of violence in more than five years of bloodletting in Algeria.
In response to the Sidi Moussa slaughter, residents in many parts of Algiers set up self-defence groups to patrol the streets, and armed themselves with iron bars, knives, petrol bombs and swords.
According to western estimates, more than 60,000 people have been killed since the country plunged into violence in January 1992, when the military cancelled a second round of elections to prevent the now-outlawed FIS from clinching a guaranteed victory.