Examination of Witness (Questions 140-159)
1 FEBRUARY 2005
DR HUGH
ROBERTS
Q140 Chairman: And who is responsible?
Dr Roberts: There are two main
groups. The most important is this group called the GSPC which
is a French acronym standing for, in English, Salafi Group for
Preaching and Combat (Groupe Salafiste pour la Pre«dication
et le Combat). The GSPC was based initially and primarily
in the area not far from Algiers, on the western edge of Kabylia
region, also the southern Kabylia region, so this is, if you like,
east-central Algeria, within 100 to 150 kilometres of the capital,
a very populated, but also mountainous area. The other main area
of the GSPC implantation was near the Tunisian border around the
town of Tebessa in the south-east of the country; I am talking
about Algeria north of the Sahara. Then, very unexpectedly, two
years ago, there was this sudden development of GSPC activity
in the Sahara with the abduction of 32 tourists, which was a very
remarkable and unprecedented development. So there has been this
third front if you like, the Saharan front to the GSPC's activity.
Q141 Chairman: During the savage war
of independence, the Kabylia was always the centre of turbulence.
Dr Roberts: The Kabylia was certainly
one of the main centres of the liberation army, that is perfectly
true and it is classic maquis country, classic guerrilla
country. So there is nothing surprising about the GSPC being implanted
there. What I think was surprising was the Saharan dimension.
Before I say a little bit more about that, could I just mention
the other two groups that are still active? There is a rump of
the old GIA, Groupe Islamique Arme«, the Armed Islamic
Group, which was the most prominent and most notorious group in
the mid-1990s. It should be explained that the GSPC is a breakaway
from the GIA; the GIA ended up splitting because of the controversial
nature of the tactics it employed, alienating some of its own
commanders who disagreed with indiscriminate terrorism and broke
away from the GIA as a result. The rump of the GIA still exists
in the area south of Algiers to the south-south-west of Algiers,
again within a relatively small radius of the capital. Finally,
there is a group further away in western Algeria in the Ouarsenis
mountains called the Guardians of the Salafi Call, or mission,
Houmat Al-Da'wa al-Salafiyya (HDS). They also are a western
fragment of the old GIA that broke away at the same time as the
GSPC in 1998 for substantially the same reasons. They are less
prominent in their activity.
Q142 Chairman: What are the links between
those groups and the informal economy?
Dr Roberts: Very clear in the
case of the GSPC. Both in the Kabylia region where it is notorious
that they are linked to what is locally known as the sand mafia,
le mafia du sable, which is an occult network which is
engaging in environmental predatory activity in relation to the
environment, taking sand out of the river beds and the sea shores.
They are also known to be involved in money laundering. In the
Tebessa area, they were involved in trafficking of containers
and of livestock and in the Sahara, this is the connection with
the Sahara, there has been a longstanding trans-Saharan smuggling
racket, particularly cigarettes, what the Algerians call the Marlborough
Connection. The person who is regarded as the king of this traffic
is linked to and involved in the GSPC, this person called Mokhtar
Belmokhtar. There is a nexus which makes one think that in fact
this activism for people like Belmokhtar is no longer anything
to do with a political project, it is almost a way of life; it
is basically criminal banditry.
Q143 Sir John Stanley: Do you think that
the present British Government and indeed the previous Conservative
British Government should have taken more rigorous measures to
check the security background of many people with an Algerian
background before giving them rights of entry and residence in
this country?
Dr Roberts: It is not an issue
which I have personally studied in any depth. I have concentrated
my efforts on trying to figure out what is going on in Algeria,
rather than debating issues here. At the same time, I think that,
as I understand it, there is no extradition arrangement with Algeria.
There is therefore a problem. There are as least two different
aspects to the problem I think you are raising. One is of course
the internal security problem for Britain, which of course has
become more visible over the last three years, but there has also
been, of course, the problem in British Algerian relations. Whether
or not that is something that one attaches a great deal of importance
to in the British Government, certainly in Algiers there has been
festering resentment over the question of Britain providing some
sort of a haven for elements which are involved in movements causing
them headaches. My own understanding of this is that one needs
to make a distinction in the question of the diaspora in relation
to al-Qaeda or similar brands of Islamic terrorism. Quite a lot
of the Algerians who came here in the early 1990s were FIS supporters,
that is to say sympathisers or supporters of the Islamic Salvation
Front which had been banned in 1992, who found that they could
not stay in France and they came to the UK as a second resort,
as a second best solution. Some of those ended up being involved
in, or sympathising or active on behalf of the GIA. Now that is
the kind of activism which is over-spill from Algeria where the
orientation is very definitely to the internal Algerian situation.
That kind of activism of course did not incline these people to
engage in terrorist activity in Britain against British targets.
I think one needs to distinguish that category from the quite
distinct category of the North African diaspora in Britain and
more generally Europe, much more established of course in places
like France and Spain, where the orientation is not to an ongoing
internal conflict in their country of origin, but is to this much
more ideological doctrinaire brand of activism, of which the example
before them is al-Qaeda. That is the category from which this
Moroccan Zacharias Mousawi, who was allegedly the 20th hijacker
on 9/11, came from. My point being that I think that in the majority
of cases of the Algerians who came here in the 1990s, there was
not a very strong reason for the government to fear a security
threat to Britain as opposed to an inclination to be active in
relation to terrorist movements in Algeria. I think that what
is regrettable is not so much that they did not take more rigorous
measures, I do not have an assessment of how rigorous those measures
were, so I withhold judgment, but what I do think is problematic
is the lack of co-ordination or discussion or consultation with
Algiers about some kind of co-operative approach or co-ordinated
approach to a problem which, after all, has two ends and which
is shared.
Q144 Sir John Stanley: I should like
to come back to that in a moment, but first of all on the point
you made about extradition, is it your own view that there should
be a proper extradition treaty between Algeria and the UK? Do
you believe that the Algerian judicial system is such that it
is a country to which the UK should be willing, be able to take
people back to Algeria to face trial?
Dr Roberts: I certainly do not
have a rosy view of the Algerian judicial system and this is an
important issue in the whole issue of reform inside the country.
That might well constitute a reason for being reluctant to remove
them. The question is: what is British general policy in these
matters? Does one only have extradition treaties with countries
whose judicial systems one has full confidence in? I do not know.
One might have nonetheless discussed the matter along the lines
of, if certain improvements or reforms or safeguards or guarantees
could be developed at the Algerian end, one might be willing to
consider an extradition treaty. My understanding is that this
is something which simply has not been addressed and that I think
is really quite a strange omission when we think that this issue
has been theoretically relevant now for 13 years.
Q145 Sir John Stanley: When you refer
to the lack of co-operation and co-ordination between Algeria
and the UK, particularly in relation to potential terrorists,
are you indicating a lack of co-operation between the intelligence
services, or a lack of co-operation politically at high ministerial
level? What are you particularly highlighting?
Dr Roberts: From 1992-93 onwards,
Algeria found itself in a general position of quarantine, very
isolated diplomatically from most of her former, or potential
partners. There is no particular reason to single the UK out in
that context but, nonetheless, my impression is that there has
been to date very little attempt to engage with the Algerians
on matters of common concern. It may well be that that is now
beginning to change, but certainly it was very, very striking
right through the 1990s, that there was virtually nothing happening
here. I am simply conscious of the degree of resentment that existed
at the Algerian end about this. Reading the Algerian press regularly,
one very frequently came across quite bitter diatribes about British
policy, the point that Oliver Miles made a moment ago about London
being a haven of terrorism and so forth. This is something you
should be aware of, given that moves are beginning to occur towards
improving and developing relations; there is a bit of a track
record to live down, so far as Algerian attitudes to the UK are
concerned.
Sir John Stanley: Thank you. You have
given us some very interesting issues to pursue.
Q146 Chairman: What about links with
al-Qaeda? Are there any such links between those groups internally
and al-Qaeda?
Dr Roberts: There is no doubt
that there are links: link of course is a very vague word. The
two groups I mentioned are fragments of the third group; they
all come from the GIA. The GIA, as its core, was set up by people
who were veterans of the Afghan war and therefore had links, before
engaging in armed activity in Algeria, links to the people around
Bin Laden. A key personality involved in setting up the GIA was
very close to Ayaman al-Zawahri, Bin Laden's principal lieutenant,
the leader of the Egyptian Jihad group. So there were connections,
going right back to the beginning of the violence in Algeria,
to the people we now call al-Qaeda. We should be wary of anachronism:
al-Qaeda as we speak of it today did not really exist in 1992.
Having said that, there are several points which should be made
to qualify this question of links. The links do not seem to me
to be very significant. First of all, there is no doubt that when
the GIA became most savage and most indiscriminate in its terrorism
in the mid-1990s, particularly 1996, 1997, 1998, this involved
a break with al-Qaeda because it was operating a doctrine that
al-Qaeda did not endorse, a doctrine that considered the entire
society as apostate; that is not al-Qaeda's doctrine. That was
the doctrine that rationalised the indiscriminate killing of civilians
by the GIA. When the GSPC and the other movement, the HDS, broke
away it was partly because they were rejecting that doctrine;
in so far as they were rejecting that, they were getting back
to the doctrinal position of al-Qaeda which regards only the state
as impious, as a licit object of Jihad, not the society. Doctrinally
you could say that the two main movements, the GSPC and the HDS
have the same outlook as al-Qaeda. What they are not doing is
participating in global Jihad activities. Their agenda is inside
Algeria. The GSPC has had networks outside Algeria performing
support functions, ancillary functions, fund raising, propaganda,
arms procurement, but these networks have not engaged in any terrorist
attacks outside the country. Its Jihad is a local Jihad, its conflict
is with the Algerian state and as such, I think that it is quite
striking that the link with al-Qaeda and even statements that
imply allegiance to al-Qaeda have been, so far as one can see,
lip service rhetoric, formal allegiance, not actually having any
practical translation.
Q147 Mr Chidgey: Picking up from that
point if I may, Dr Roberts. It does appear that things have moved
on since the appalling atrocities of the previous decade. It does
appear that significant progress was made with the 2004 presidential
elections. However, it does also appear that serious concerns
remain about the legal system. What are the prospects for a genuine
process of political reform?
Dr Roberts: It entirely depends
on what you mean by reform. My view is, as I think I briefly stated,
that what we are seeing at the moment is, in some respects, an
authoritarian development, but on the basis of primacy of the
civilian wing of the regime and the effacement of the military.
The price for this is being paid in part by formal political pluralism;
the political parties are being marginalised as part of this process.
That is because of the extent to which the political pluralism
of the 1990s, from 1989 onwards, was actually linked to the primacy
of the military. The military operated through a strategy of manipulation
of political parties with the shift of power from the general
staff of the army to the presidency under Bouteflika. Bouteflika
is taking control of the political sphere; he is taking it away
from the generals and from their proxies in some of the political
parties. What we are looking at at the moment has two faces: a
very considerable reinforcement of the presidency, which I personally
argued throughout the 1990s has been a condition of a resolution
of the crisis of the state, that the weakness of the presidency
has been one of the premises of the continuing crisis because
it has meant that no civilian figure has had the authority to
impose any kind of binding arbitration or impose any kind of strategy
for resolving. No-one could do a De Gaulle in this situation.
So Bouteflika strengthening the presidency is something I personally
think is positive, but it has a cost. Where might this go? My
own view is that over the next few years, there will be a change
in the political climate in the country as the prospect of l'apre"s
Bouteflika emerges on the horizon. Bouteflika is 67, soon 68.
Under the present constitution he is not allowed a third term
and therefore minds will have to be concentrated fairly soon.
My own view is that formal pluralism continuing to exist, we can
look for some kind of a new development in the party political
sphere which might well permit some kind of recovery of a democratic
development in the society. In the short run however, what we
are seeing is an authoritarian approach which is concerned first
to end the violence through a process of national reconciliation,
for which Bouteflika feels he has a mandate from the elections,
because that was the principal plank in his electoral manifesto
and second, an attempt to re-launch the economy, an attempt that
is rather dirigiste in spirit and may not be very effective,
but it is also an important element of strategy of national reconciliation.
Q148 Mr Chidgey: You pose a rather interesting
paradox in suggesting, I think I understood you properly, that
with the withdrawal, or perhaps forced withdrawal of the army
from politics, so obviously party democracy has been weakened.
It is not something we normally find in a state.
Dr Roberts: I have always argued
that the party pluralism which existed in Algeria was really rather
phoney, that these were not real political parties, these were
relays for the generals operating as representing different positions
about identity, Berberism, Islamism and so forth. None of these
parties was capable of being alternative governments. None of
them had programmes addressing the general range of issues that
any Algerian Government should face. None of them actually constituted
an alternative to the status quo and that is why they were
so congenial to the generals. It was a way of organising divide
and rule.
Q149 Mr Chidgey: Referring to an earlier
answer you gave to Sir John, I think helps me answer my question
myself in a way. You always made it clear to us that as far as
the war against terror is concerned or, if you like, the international
war against terrorism is concerned, in Algeria this has been an
inward concept of terrorism, rather than an international concept,
so consequently that is not a card for the army to play to restore
themselves to any position of power. You need the army involved
in politics, in governing the country, to be involved in the international
war against terrorism.
Dr Roberts: Well, it has turned
out that way, but a couple of years ago it looked as though the
army was using the war on terrorism quite effectively to shore
up its position.
Q150 Mr Chidgey: International war.
Dr Roberts: Yes, yes, precisely;
as a source. The Algerian attitude to the war on terrorism was
"Thank you for at last joining our war on terrorism".
There was an element of a sardonic aspect of the Algerian discourse
on this, which reflected the fact that there was a longstanding
critical attitude to the West in general, but the US in particular
as being originally part of the source of their problem. Everyone
in Algeria knows perfectly well that their problem has been, amongst
other things, part of the fall-out from Afghanistan.
Q151 Mr Chidgey: Yes, I see.
Dr Roberts: When 9/11 happened,
the Algerians immediately declared their position four square
alongside the Americans. They saw this very lucidly as an opportunity
to consolidate their own emergence from diplomatic purdah and
the army, I believe, also saw this as an opportunity to secure
external backing and external legitimation for its own position.
Surprisingly in some respects, it has not worked to keep them
at the front of the political stage and the argument which has
prevailed within the Algerian army is a rather different one,
that in order to maximise the benefits from security co-operation
with our Western partners, particularly NATO, we need to withdraw
from our over-exposed role in the system of government back home.
That is the argument which has prevailed and that has been a premise
of Bouteflika's ability to get a second term.
Q152 Mr Chidgey: Does that therefore
mean that there is now an opportunity with the backing off of
the army, if you like, to make some progress towards improvement
in the human rights situation?
Dr Roberts: I think there is definitely
an opportunity there. This is a matter in debate. The problem,
however, is, as often happens in Algeria, that the debate gets
bogged down in extremely septic issues, the most septic at the
moment in this context being the issue of the disappeared. We
have a number of different organisations beavering away on this
issue, we have a state-sponsored organisation which is functioning
as the flak catcher on this issue, the cut-out, to moderate the
problem and deflect pressures. I am rather pessimistic about this
going anywhere and the Algerian Government is past master at deflecting
pressure into unproductive avenues, where passions run high. What
no-one is really addressing effectively in my view is the underlying
problem about human rights, which is linked to the underlying
problem of the judiciary, the fact the judiciary is not independent;
you do not have a robustly independent judiciary. The Algerian
judiciary is in a worse condition that the Egyptian in that respect.
Ultimately this is a function of the fact that you have a very,
very weak legislature and therefore an unaccountable executive;
the judiciary ultimately does come under enormous pressure from
the government, from the upper echelons of the executive branch
and all of this means that arbitrariness is built into the way
things work. Human rights violations are simply the most brutal
expression of a general tendency to arbitrariness and it is something
that, as at present, a substantially unreformed political system
cannot really address except in a superficial way.
Q153 Mr Chidgey: Some commentators argue
that there is now a very urgent need for national reconciliation
after the years of conflicts in Algeria. In your view, is this
being taken seriously by the Algerian Government, by the president?
Dr Roberts: It was the most important
reason why people voted for him last year. I was there at the
time and I listened to his speeches and they evoked enthusiasm
and it was a recovery, at any rate of the level of rhetoric, of
the Algerian national idea and people voted for it, they liked
it. It was, amongst other things, saying "We are fed up with
all this identity politics, Islamism, Berberism, what have you,
we are all Algerians, we are all Muslims. What is this?".
He is now under some pressure to deliver. He has raised expectations.
I also think that as president he has an institutional interest
in delivering. He does have an interest in the violence ending.
There were grounds for suspecting that the Algerian army did not
have any trust in the violence ending, that the Algerian army
had a rather cold Machiavellian attitude that a certain level
of violence was something that they could live with and it actually
had dividends.
Q154 Mr Chidgey: Just so far as they
are involved.
Dr Roberts: Yes. I do not think
that that applies to Bouteflika; I think he has a genuine interest
in putting an end to it. He also knows that he cannot do this
without a degree of political negotiation. It cannot be done by
purely military means; there has to be some sort of a deal offered
to the GSPC, as was offered to earlier movements which accepted
a deal and dissolved themselves. He cannot make that deal if there
is not political backing in the society, in the wider political
class. There are grounds for giving him at least the benefit of
the doubt as to his being in earnest about this and he has made
some interesting moves recently, including enlisting Algeria's
first president, the very elderly Ahmed Ben Bella in a key prominent
role in organising a national commission on a general amnesty.
These are controversial issues, but the signs are some movement
is occurring towards making something happen.
Q155 Mr Chidgey: Finally, is there a
role for the European Union? What would the role be in improving
the socio-economic situation in Algeria and for the Algerians,
or would they too look towards the AU rather than the EU?
Dr Roberts: They have signed an
association agreement and this is a bit controversial, there is
a lot of criticism in Algeria of the implications of the association
agreement. On the other hand, there is absolutely no doubt the
Algerians know perfectly well that they are locked into an eternal
relationship with Europe and they want to make the most of it.
In this context there has been a very definite improvement in
Algerian-French relations. The government is very concerned to
balance the US and the French connection so that they are not
in the pocket of either and make each work in a renegotiation
of the terms of the other. In relation to the European Union,
my own view, and the view that the ICG has argued, is that specifically
in relation to the question of terrorism or the security question,
the EU can help, should help, or should certainly explore the
possibilities of helping the Algerians in relation to the link
we have already discussed between terrorist activity and mafia
economics; smuggling, illicit movements of goods and money and
also, of course, human flows. This is something that the EU really
should address and it links up perhaps to a wider and much bigger
can of worms, the general question of the Western end of corruption
networks. Certainly the EU could help there and we also feel it
could help, and should help, in the security sphere. The EU should
be concerned with the wider security implications of what may
or may not be happening in the Sahel region to the south of Algeria.
There is, as you probably know, this American pan-Sahel initiative.
The Americans are involved in developing anti security capacities
in several of Algeria's southern neighbours, Chad, Niger, Mali
and Mauritania.
Q156 Mr Chidgey: Francophone Africa.
Dr Roberts: The rationale for
this being that there is a major security threat in this area,
which in fact has not manifested itself in any real activity and
therefore I am certainly sceptical about this. One should not
of course ignore the possibility that they may develop and I personally
think that the EU has an interest and could play a role in complementing
US assistance in that area. That would be something in which the
Algerians would be quite interested, should the EU wake up to
that possibility.
Mr Chidgey: That it very interesting.
Thank you very much.
Q157 Mr Illsley: Dr Roberts, I wonder
whether you could shed some light on an issue which was raised
with us a few days ago in relation to Algeria's relations with
Morocco regarding prisoners held by the Polisario movement, somewhere
in Western Sahara but obviously within the remit of Algeria. We
were told that something like 410 of these prisoners have been
held for over 25 years and they were referred to as the longest
serving prisoners ever held anywhere in the world at the moment.
Do you have any information on the relations between the two countries
in relation to that?
Dr Roberts: Are these Moroccan
prisoners or Algerian prisoners?
Q158 Mr Illsley: Moroccan prisoners held
by the Polisario, perhaps with the connivance of Algeria, I am
not sure.
Dr Roberts: It would be with Algeria's
knowledge and consent or acquiescence. Yes, it is horrifying.
I am not sure what I can usefully tell you about this. It is not
something that I have made a specialist study of, but clearly
there have been these human victims of this terribly blocked situation.
The position on the Western Sahara is immobile; we have seen James
Baker give us in despair and as a consequence there are these
human victims and it is appalling. Precisely why it should be
politically impossible to release them, pending any kind of breakthrough
on the actual substance of the conflict, I am not sure but I assume
that it is simply a cold-hearted political calculus operating
here that does not necessarily only operate in one direction.
I would not want to encourage you to assume that there are only
Moroccan victims of this impasse, but it seems to me that there
is a problem. It is very likely to be connected to the general
problem of the unwillingness of the Moroccans to treat the Polisario
as an interlocutor. That in itself is an inhibiting factor.
Q159 Mr Illsley: Does it affect relations
between Algeria and Morocco to any great extent? Is there an acceptance
of this situation and a resignation that the thing is going to
exist in this state for some more time to come or does it periodically
flare up into differences of opinion between the two countries?
Dr Roberts: My view of this is
that it is quite impossible for the Moroccan Government to withdraw
on the substance of its claim to the Western Sahara. The internal
political costs would be enormous; it would quite possibly destabilise
it. Therefore, it has no reason to take any chances in moving
significantly. On the Algerian side, the Algerians also have little
incentive. The status quo is something that does not cause
them any major burden. It has a potential dividend for both sides
in that, of course, it is an opportunity to bang the nationalist
drum when you need to do so as a distraction from other problems.
There is a perfectly understood element in the repertoire of both
governments that this is something they can use when it suits
them to do so and that there just is not sufficient incentive
to move out of the trenches; maybe that is because the nature
of the problem has been conceived in a way that has led to the
impasse and that a new approach is required, but it is not clear
what that might be.
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