Video | Fresh rioting breaks out in Algerian capital Algiers, on-going since New Year
Fresh rioting, sporadic since the New Year, has broken out in the Algerian capital and two other cities after days of unrest over food price increases and unemployment.
Police fired tear gas at stone-throwing youths following Friday prayers in Algiers while clashes were also reported in the eastern city of Annaba in riots linked to rising food prices, housing shortages, and wider social and political grievances.
The riots are widely seen as drawing on deep frustrations with the ruling elite and a lack of political freedom, as well as more immediate concerns about the cost of living, housing, and jobs.
The prices of flour, cooking oil and sugar have doubled in the past few months.
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Overnight, protesters ransacked government buildings, banks and post offices in "several eastern cities", including Constantine, Jijel, Setif and Bouira, according to the official APS news agency.
The riots also spread to Bab el-Oued, a working class district of the capital that was at the centre of the protest movement in 1988, at the beginning of a period of unrest that led to an Islamist insurgency in the 1990s.
The unrest resumed despite the presence of riot police armed with tear gas and batons outside mosques in Algiers and along its main streets. In the Belcourt district, youths threw stones at police after Friday prayers and set up road blocks, Reuters news agency reported.
Clashes also erupted for the first time in Annaba, about 550km (350 miles) east of the capital, where hundreds of people threw stones at police deployed outside government offices, according to AFP.
There was also fresh violence reported in Algeria's second city of Oran.
However, Algeria's trade minister told a local state-run TV channel that following a meeting with wholesalers, the price of sugar and cooking oil would drop next week. The official unemployment rate meanwhile stands at about 10%, although independent organisations say it is closer to 25%.
