After years of bloody civil war, Algerians overwhelmingly voted in favour of a plan of national reconciliation that would give amnesty to thousands of suspected Islamic terrorists, Interior Minister Noureddine Yazid Zerhouni announced on Friday.
According to official figures, 97,36% of those casting their ballots approved President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s Charter for Peace and National Reconciliation.
Nearly 80% of Algeria’s more than 18-million eligible voters went to the polls on Thursday to cast their ballots in the referendum.
The amnesty was part of an ambitious proposal by Bouteflika to turn the page on the bloody civil war that has killed up to 200 000 people.
The so-called ”black decade” in Algerian history followed the annulment of the second round of the 1992 parliamentary elections that Islamic fundamentalist parties were poised to win. — Sapa-DPA