Bomb Kills At Least 38 In Algeria 256 Injured In Downtown Blast

In the worst bombing of a 3-year Muslim insurgency, an explosives-packed car blew up Monday in a street bustling with pedestrians preparing for Ramadan. At least 38 people were killed and 256 wounded, state TV said.

The bomb went off in a downtown commercial district near the main post office and train station. Businesses were particularly crowded in anticipation of the monthlong holiday.

There was no claim of responsibility. Security forces blamed “criminals” - the official term for fundamentalist guerrillas seeking to topple the army-backed government and install an Islamic state in Algeria.

More than 15,000 people - including about 80 foreigners - have been killed in fighting between the militants and security forces since January 1992. Nine people died in a bombing at Algiers airport in August 1992, but nothing in the central part of the capital has approached the devastation of Monday’s attack.

The powerful bomb incinerated numerous cars, shattered windows in buildings several blocks away and blew a crater in the sidewalk nearly 2 yards wide and more than 20 inches deep.

It exploded at 3:20 p.m. in front of a bank office across the street from the central police station.

People with faces and hands bloodied by flying glass ran frantically through the street, and ambulances rushed to the scene.

State radio instructed all doctors to report to work and appealed for volunteer blood donors.

The car that contained the bomb was reduced to a heap of twisted metal. Radio reports said it was a white Fiat stolen earlier in the day in the Algiers suburb of Larbaa, a Muslim fundamentalist stronghold.

Policemen clutching automatic rifles and backed by armored vehicles cordoned off the area, pushing and sometimes kicking away would-be onlookers.

Sporadic automatic gunfire was heard shortly after the explosion, possibly from nervous officers firing into the air.