The European Union has sent a diplomatic mission to Algeria, to discuss the violence that continues to plague the country. Algerian officials have accepted the mission but say its sole aim is to find ways of co-operating in the fight against terrorism. So will the officials' hands be tied before they even begin? Here to look at the new level of international concern about the brutal massacres in Algeria is our Middle East analyst, Roger Hardy.

In recent years, world leaders have been reluctant to speak out about Algeria. They've been wary of earning an instant rebuke from a notoriously touchy Algerian government. They've found it hard to come up with a political formula which might conceivably end the violence -- and which they might then try to get the authorities in Algiers to adopt. And economic factors have been at work too. So far the massacres have taken place in the northern part of the country -- well away from the oil and gas fields on which the outside world relies.

So the Algerians have suffered not just from brutal attacks which the authorities seem powerless to prevent, but also from what looks suspiciously like the world's indifference. They have, for the most part, suffered behind a wall of silence.

But over the last few months, the first cracks in that wall have started to appear. The first world leader to speak out was the UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, in August last year. Since then, there's been a groundswell of condemnation of the massacres and demands for an independent inquiry into who's carrying them out. The Algerian authorities say the violence is the work of Islamic extremists they refer to as terrorists and criminals. But human-rights groups and others -- both inside and outside the country -- have alleged that the authorities may be turning a blind eye to the violence, or may even be involved in some of the killings themselves.

Calls for outside intervention have drawn an angry response from the Algerian government, which tends to see even the most mildly-worded statement of concern as flagrant interference in the country's internal affairs. A week ago, the US State Department called for an international inquiry into the massacres. In response, the US ambassador was summoned to receive a severe ticking-off from Algerian officials.

Now the European Union is stepping cautiously into the minefield. In response to a German initiative, it's decided to send a mission to Algeria as soon as possible. It's the first foreign mission the Algerian authorities have agreed to accept since the conflict began in 1992, when the military cancelled elections the main Islamic opposition party was set to win.

The mission will be made up of officials from the so-called "troika" -- the past, present and future holders of the EU presidency -- currently Britain, Luxembourg and Austria. The Algerian authorities insist it won't be a fact-finding mission but will simply discuss ways to co-operate in the fight against terrorism. They want the Europeans, for example, to shut down the networks which, they allege, are providing Algerian extremist groups with money and weapons. For their part, European officials want to offer humanitarian aid to the victims of the violence -- something the Algerian government says it doesn't need. More important, they want to establish a dialogue on ways to deal with a problem which, they argue, has serious implications, not just for north Africa, but for Europe and the whole Mediterranean region.

Having delayed such an initiative for so long, the Europeans seem aware that their chances of making any serious impact on the crisis are extremely limited.
 

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