Hardly a day goes by in Algeria without reports of further outrages, with the victims almost invariably being ordinary civilians. Among the most gruesome of the latest reports, another massacre of villagers at Lowba, about 35km south east of Algiers. According to Algerian newspapers, 31 people were killed, including 10 women and 13 children. Some had their throats cut, others died in the blaze when their houses were set on fire. Two young women were also abducted. Earlier in the week, the raped and mutilated bodies of four young women were found in an Algiers suburb, where 14 other people had been murdered in an attack last weekend. The latest reports said that in addition to the attacks at Lowba, suspected Islamic extremists also set out a check point on a road to the east of Algiers and killed about five travellers, though one account says as many as 30 people may have been slaughtered there. The toll of the blood-letting continues to mount day by day, and week by week. With all the governments efforts to root out the culprits apparently only stirring them to greater endeavours. Despite growing international concern of the carnage, the Algerian government continues to rule out any suggestion of outside intervention. The latest call by the new United Nations human rights commissionier, Mary Robertson, for a team of outside experts to report on human rights abuses in the Algerian conflict, was angrily rejected by the authorities in Algiers.