Two press convoys organised after lifting of ban

The authorities have lifted their ban on foreign correspondents going to the Kabylie region, imposed on 26 May, but they can only go there now in police-escorted convoys. The communications ministry has organised two – one to Tizi-Ouzou (110 km east of Algiers), the capital of the Great Kabylie, and one to Bejaia (260 km east of Algiers), capital of the Little Kabylie. Until the ban, foreign correspondents could go where they liked on their own. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 05.27.2002 - Foreign media barred from Kabylie during Algerian elections Reporters Without Borders today protested against the Algerian government's refusal to allow foreign journalists covering the country's forthcoming parliamentary elections to go to the Kabylie region. "The promising sign of many foreign reporters being readily granted visas to cover the elections has come to nothing and the authorities have given a ridiculous excuse as to why the media cannot freely cover the vote in the Kabylie," said Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Robert Ménard. "This just proves they want to hold the elections in secret there." The communications ministry justified the ban, announced in 24 May and effective the next day, by citing an "incident" in Kabylie on 23 May when police escorting a French TV crew from the France 2 station were allegedly "set upon by demonstrators" near Tizi-Ouzou. About 20 foreign journalists wrote a protest letter to the Algerian authorities asking to be allowed to "work normally in all parts of Algeria" and said that "under present circumstances, we cannot cover the elections properly." Foreign minister Abdelaziz Belkhadem told a press conference in Algiers on 27 May that he was "surprised" to learn of the ban and would "discuss it with other members of the government." Foreign journalists resident in Algeria have not been notified of the ban. All foreign journalists in Algiers are obliged to move around with a government escort of one or two men who, according to some of the journalists, are more concerned with what reporters are doing than with protecting them.