9781422280690

Algeria

The Berbers Berbers are groups of peoples indigenous to northern Africa. They are distributed in an area stretching from the Atlantic Ocean to the Siwa Oasis in Egypt, and from the Mediterranean Sea to the Niger River. Today, most Berber people live in north African countries, mainly in Algeria and Morocco; small Berber populations are also found in Niger, Mali, Libya, Mauritania, Tunisia, Burkina Faso, and Egypt. Immigrant communities also live in France, Canada, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, and other countries. kingdom of Numidia was absorbed into Carthage. Numidia tried to extricate itself, only to be seized by Rome in 200 BC. On the collapse of the Roman Empire, Vandals assumed control but were expelled by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I, who retained control until Islam arrived in the 7th century. The Fatimids rapidly established an empire in the north-east, but following the Reconquista, Spain began to attack Algerian coastal cities in the 15th and 16th centuries, prompting help from the Ottoman Empire. Algeria became a département of France in 1848. In 1954 the National Liberation Front (FLN), that was to

ABOVE: Constantine is a large city in eastern Algeria. LEFT: A Berber in traditional dress. OPPOSITE: The beautiful and captivating Sahara Desert in Algeria. Colonel Houari Boumédienne in 1965, who established a military council and began reforms, among them a national health service. In 1991 the Fundamentalist Islamic dominate Algerian politics for the next 40 years, launched a war claiming 350,000 lives. In 1962 Algeria gained independence, and Ahmed Ben Bella came to power. He was overthrown in a coup by

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