Algeria said on Friday that its army had killed seven jihadists and lost three soldiers during a military operation in the east of the country.
A defense ministry statement said that “as part of the fight against terrorism,” army detachments launched operations on Thursday night in Tebessa province, near the Tunisian border.
It said the army killed “seven terrorists,” including two jihadist leaders, Youcef Salah and Haddad Bilal, and seized guns as well as ammunition.
The ministry said three soldiers were killed in the clash.
Early last month, the ministry said the army had killed four “terrorists” during an operation in a mountainous region of the northwest.
The army regularly announces the arrests or deaths of “terrorists,” the authorities’ term for armed Islamists still active since the North African country’s 1992-2002 civil war.
Despite a 2005 Charter for Peace and Reconciliation aimed at turning the page on the violence, armed groups continue to mount sporadic attacks.
The so-called “black decade” of the civil war officially left 200,000 people dead.
