Police crackdown on student protesters in Algiers probed

Algerian Interior Minister Noureddine Badawi has announced that an investigation will be launched into the abuses at the hands of police authorities during a break up of a protest of pharmacy students earlier this week.

The students held a protest outside the Mustapha Pasha Hospital in the capital, Algiers on Wednesday but authorities were soon swift in descending on to the scene and quelling the demonstration.

Badawi confirmed the investigation while on a visit to Tizi Ouzou following videos surfacing online where police officers were shown violently dealing with some protesters.

Read: Algeria arrests those ‘peacefully criticising the government’, Amnesty

Viewers online and on social networking sites have demanded punishment of the perpetrators of the violence.

Students and teachers have taken part in a number of demonstrations and strikes in the last couple of months to protest changes in the education sector, limited freedoms and calls for the resignation of the director of education.

Last month, protests erupted in the north of the country following the announcement of austerity measures and budget cuts in the new Finance Law. Hundreds were arrested following attacks on buildings and shopkeepers underwent a strike in protest of the new measures.