Algeria's Growing Security Problems

"For its part, the state was long divided between the conciliateurs, who wanted to negotiate a resolution to the conflict, and the eradicateurs, who preferred to annihilate the Islamists. Notwithstanding President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's conciliatory efforts, the eradicateur camp still dominates Algerian military and counterterrorism policy. Accordingly, the state continues to treat Islamist violence as an extension of the 1990s conflict, leading authorities to narrowly focus on eliminating residual domestic threats in a piecemeal, ad hoc manner. "Countering violent extremism" is largely treated as a military endeavor, while terrorism remains a persistent problem."