2010–2012 Algerian protests
| 2010–12 Algerian protests | |
|---|---|
| Part of the Arab Spring | |
Demonstration organised by RCD in Algiers
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| Date | 28 December 2010 – 10 January 2012 (1 year, 1 week and 6 days) |
| Location | Algeria |
| Caused by | |
| Goals | |
| Methods | |
| Status | finished |
| Casualties | |
| Death(s) | 8 |
| Injuries | 420+ |
The 2010–12 Algerian protests was a series of protests taking place throughout Algeria, lasting from 28 December 2010 to early 2012. The protests had been inspired by similar protests across the Middle East and North Africa. Causes cited by the protesters included unemployment, the lack of housing, food-price inflation, corruption, restrictions on freedom of speech and poor living conditions. While localized protests were already commonplace over previous years, extending into December 2010, an unprecedented wave of simultaneous protests and riots, sparked by sudden rises in staple food prices, erupted all over the country starting in January 2011. These were quelled by government measures to lower food prices, but were followed by a wave of self-immolations, most of them in front of government buildings. Opposition parties, unions, and human rights organisations then began to hold weekly demonstrations, despite these being illegal without government permission under the ongoing state of emergency; the government suppressed these demonstrations as far as possible, but in late February yielded to pressure and lifted the state of emergency. Meanwhile, protests by unemployed youth, typically citing unemployment, hogra (oppression), and infrastructure problems, resumed, occurring almost daily in towns scattered all over the country.
After the riots of 1988, the Algerian government had moved towards democracy, holding free elections. However, when the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) won the first free parliamentary election in 1991, the military staged a coup d'état, voided the election results, declared a state of emergency which remained in force until 2011, and arrested the FIS leadership. This led to the founding of the Armed Islamic Groups (GIA) and the ten-year Algerian Civil War, in which an estimated 250,000 people were killed.
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