Paris - Algeria's latest massacres, in which 78 villagers died overnight on Tuesday and Wednesday, brought more shock and despair to Algiers on New Year's Day. "There are small groups of people near kiosks discussing the killings, reading about them in the one newspaper that came out today," an Algerian resident said by telephone. "I heard one say quite despairingly, `It's Ramadan and the start of the year and the killings go on'."
In Algeria the holy month of Ramadan has become one of the most feared times for civilians as Muslim rebels argue it is propitious for what they call their "holy" struggle.
