Algeria urges greater Arab cooperation against terrorism

Algerian Interior Minister Mostefa Benmansour has urged Arab countries to improve their cooperation against terrorism, Algerian TV reported.

Speaking to a meeting of Arab interior ministers in Tunis on Sunday, Benmansour warned that there were countries which tolerated and supported terrorists in order to bring about instability in the Arab world.

"Terrorism would have not developed were it not for the leniency, and even collusion, of some countries which do not wish to see our Arab world settled and its people develop and progress," the TV quoted him as saying.

"The Arab world is vulnerable to this epidemic.

It must mobilize its energies and unify its efforts in order to establish better cooperation." Benmansour said Algeria had confronted terrorism and had been "paying a high price for maintaining its dignity, sovereignty, culture and democracy" .

"With its strong willpower and faith, Algeria has managed to confront destructive terrorism...Algeria strongly believes that its fight against terrorism is not for its own good alone but for the entire Arab nation and the international community," he said.

BBC Monitoring (http://www.monitor.bbc.co.uk), based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.