1 One of Algeria's top Islamic leaders has condemned a plan for presidential elections this summer, calling it a ploy by a corrupt government that will only intensify the country's three-year Islamic insurgency.
2 Algeria's leading opposition parties have already dismissed the military government's plan for elections.
3 They say the elections are premature given the climate of violence and will lack legitimacy if they do not include the outlawed Islamic Salvation Front, which was set to win the 1992 elections that the military government canceled.
4 More than 15,000 people, including about 80 foreigners, have been killed in the fighting between the militants and security forces, spawned by the cancellation of the elections.
5 The statement by Ali Belhadj, the Salvation Front's No. 2 leader, further dashed hopes for a compromise solution.
6 'The coming presidential elections when the country is suffering from the current situation will not solve the crisis,' Belhadj wrote in a letter published Wednesday in the London-based Arabic daily Al-Hayat.
7 'It will make the crisis more dangerous,' he said. The letter was dated Friday and addressed to Algeria's communication minister. Al-Hayat did not say how it obtained the letter.
8 Belhadj is under house arrest. His release from prison last September was seen as a conciliatory move by the government, but violence by both the government and militants has since mounted.
9 On Monday, a car bomb in Algiers killed 42 people, sending a wave of revulsion through the country. No group claimed responsibility but the government blamed Islamic extremists.
10 A leader of the Salvation Front denounced the bombing.
11 In the letter, Belhadj also accused the government of corruption and of devising the elections as a cover to 'protect the criminals from the masses and hide the contracts and money deals they signed without the knowledge of the people.'
12 President Liamine Zeroual has reiterated his government's intention to hold the elections this summer, possibly as early as July. His government has resisted pressure to hold talks based on a proposal drafted in January by the main legal opposition parties and the Salvation Front.

More than 15 , 000 people , including about 80 foreigners , have been killed in the fighting between the militants and security forces , spawned by the cancellation of the elections .
including about 80 foreigners ,
Foreigners from which countries?