AFP: ALGIERS: Algerian troops have killed two armed Islamists in separate operations east of the capital, the defence ministry said on Monday.

 

The two men were killed on Sunday evening, one during clashes with security forces in the Tadmait area of the restive Tizi Ouzou region, around 110 kilometres (70 miles) from Algiers, the ministry said in a statement.

 

The second gunman was killed in an army ambush in the Baghlia area of Boumerdes, some 50 kilometres from the capital.

 

A quantity of weapons, including Kalashnikov assault rifles and ammunition, was seized in both operations.

 

Violence attributed to Islamists has declined considerably in Algeria in recent years, after a decade of appalling blood-letting during the civil war of the 1990s.

 

But groups affiliated with Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb continue to attack security forces in the eastern Kabylie region, in areas around the capital and in the south.