Swiss Prosecutor Indicts Former Algerian Minister

FILE - Former Algerian Defense Minister and retired Gen. Khaled Nezzar smiles as he answers reporters at the Paris courthouse Monday, July 1, 2002. (AP Photo/Amel Pain, File)
FILE - Former Algerian Defense Minister and retired Gen. Khaled Nezzar smiles as he answers reporters at the Paris courthouse Monday, July 1, 2002. (AP Photo/Amel Pain, File)
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Swiss Prosecutor Indicts Former Algerian Minister

FILE - Former Algerian Defense Minister and retired Gen. Khaled Nezzar smiles as he answers reporters at the Paris courthouse Monday, July 1, 2002. (AP Photo/Amel Pain, File)
FILE - Former Algerian Defense Minister and retired Gen. Khaled Nezzar smiles as he answers reporters at the Paris courthouse Monday, July 1, 2002. (AP Photo/Amel Pain, File)

The office of Switzerland's Attorney General has filed an indictment against Algeria's former military chief for suspected crimes against humanity during the country's 1990s civil war, it said in a statement on Tuesday.

The indictment against former Defense Minister Khaled Nezzar, who is believed to live in Algeria but who could be tried in his absence, relates to alleged crimes committed between 1992 and 1994, Reuters quoted the statement as saying.

Swiss-based non-governmental organisation TRIAL International brought a criminal complaint against Nezzar under a law passed in Switzerland in 2011, which allows prosecution for serious crimes committed anywhere, under the principle of universal jurisdiction.

Reuters could not immediately contact Nezzar, or a Geneva-based lawyer who has previously represented him, for comment. Nezzar has previously denied accusations of wrongdoing during the war in comments to Algerian media.

Nezzar was arrested in Geneva in 2011, but he was released after two days of hearings and was believed to have returned to Algeria.

The new indictment means there will be a trial even if Nezzar, who is in his 80s, is not present, TRIAL International said.

The Attorney General's office said its investigations had been "complex" and at one stage temporarily abandoned the proceedings amid questions over its own jurisdiction to assess alleged war crimes.

Nezzar is set to be the highest-level military official ever to be tried using universal jurisdiction laws, according to TRIAL.

It would be one of only a handful of such cases to be heard in Switzerland and the second-ever hearing for crimes against humanity after a case against a Liberian warlord concluded this year.

Nezzar became Algeria's defense minister in 1990 and was involved when its military seized power the following year and overturned a parliamentary election that had been won by the Islamic Salvation Front.

The ensuing violence, dubbed the "dirty war", lasted until 1999 and some 200,000 people died, mainly civilians massacred by groups the military said were Islamist fighters.



At Least 20 Killed in Israeli Strike on Lebanon’s Alamat, Ministry Says

People check the damage a day after Israeli airstrikes that targeted the eastern Lebanese village of Knaisseh near Baalbek in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley on November 10, 2024. (AFP)
People check the damage a day after Israeli airstrikes that targeted the eastern Lebanese village of Knaisseh near Baalbek in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley on November 10, 2024. (AFP)
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At Least 20 Killed in Israeli Strike on Lebanon’s Alamat, Ministry Says

People check the damage a day after Israeli airstrikes that targeted the eastern Lebanese village of Knaisseh near Baalbek in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley on November 10, 2024. (AFP)
People check the damage a day after Israeli airstrikes that targeted the eastern Lebanese village of Knaisseh near Baalbek in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley on November 10, 2024. (AFP)

At least 20 people, including three children, were killed and six others injured in an Israeli strike on Alamat in Lebanon's Mount Lebanon province, Lebanon's health ministry said on Sunday.

Aalmat is located north of Beirut and far from the areas in southern and eastern Lebanon where the Hezbollah group has a major presence.

The Health Ministry said a further six people were wounded. There was no immediate Israeli comment.

Hezbollah began firing rockets, drones and missiles into Israel after war broke out in Gaza in 2023 in solidarity with the Palestinians and its fellow Iran-backed armed group Hamas.

Israel retaliated, and a series of escalations over several months led to all-out war in September, when Israel carried out a wave of heavy strikes and killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, as well as most of his top commanders.

Since then, Israel has struck areas deeper and deeper inside Lebanon, while Hezbollah has expanded its rocket fire from northern to central Israel. The fighting has killed over 3,000 people in Lebanon, according to the Health Ministry, and more than 70 people in Israel.

In videos purporting to show the aftermath of Sunday's strike in Aalmat, some 40 kilometers (25 miles) north of Beirut, people were seen pulling the body of a little girl out of the rubble. The house had been flattened, and several cars nearby were also damaged.

The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led fighters blew holes in the border fence and stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. They killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted around 250. Some 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, about a third of whom are believed to be dead.

Israel's offensive has killed over 43,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities who do not distinguish between civilians and militants in their count but say over half the fatalities were women and children.