ALGIERS, Algeria - Car bombs exploded minutes apart Tuesday in central Algiers, heavily damaging U.N. offices and partly ripping the facade off a new government building. The interior minister said 22 people were killed, including U.N. workers, but hospital and rescue officials gave figures at least twice that toll.
Suspicions quickly focused on militants affiliated with al-Qaida, which claimed responsibility for attacking the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad in 2003.
The two bombs exploded around 9:30 a.m., and one had deliberately targeted United Nations offices, according to the head of the U.N. refugee agency in Geneva. The other bomb struck Algeria’s Constitutional Council, said Interior Minister Noureddine Yazid Zerhouni.
