The Algerian National People's Assembly adopted a draft to amend the Penal Code to include the death penalty for crimes of setting fire and kidnapping children. After its approval, the text moves to the National Assembly, the second chamber of Parliament, for discussion and voting on it, before it is signed by the President of the Republic and issued in the Official Gazette to begin its implementation.

Published on: 01/10/2026 - 15:48 Last updated: 02/10/2026 - 13:08

On Thursday, the Algerian National People's Assembly approved an amendment to the Penal Code and expanded the scope of the death penalty to include those who commit crimes of setting fires in forests. President Abdelmadjid Tebboune had called for this measure after deadly fires that the country witnessed during the summer.

Council President Khalida Boufdesh announced that the Council had voted “on the entire Penal Code.” The text of the amendment also notes the expansion of the scope of crimes punishable by death, to also include the kidnapping of children.

Minister of Justice Lotfi Boudjemaa considered that "approving the death penalty for these acts is the appropriate legal response to defeat these crimes."

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He explained before the representatives on Monday that the amendment to the Penal Code concerns two articles, with “raising the penalty for setting fires in fields and forests from 20 years to death,” as well as the “felony of child kidnapping,” whose penalty was increased from life imprisonment to death.

With regard to child kidnapping, the draft includes amendments to Article 291, proposing the death penalty in specific cases of kidnapping, torturing, sexually assaulting, or otherwise abusing a child, in accordance with the conditions specified by the text.

Execution of death sentences has been suspended for more than three decades

The minister stated that the death penalty has been stipulated in the Penal Code since 1966 for setting fires that lead to death and kidnapping children “if it is accompanied by violence or a demand for ransom or leads to the death of the child,” according to the current Penal Code.

Since 1993, the Algerian judiciary has issued death sentences that included cases related to terrorism and premeditated murder, without implementing them.

But in late August, after a wave of deadly fires swept across the northeast of the country, Tebboune ordered the Minister of Justice to amend the Penal Code to impose the death penalty on people who start forest fires, and for the sentence to be executed upon them as soon as they exhaust their right to appeal “so that society takes what is due from them.”

Amnesty International called on Algeria to "immediately abandon any plans to expand the scope of the death penalty or resume executions more than three decades after they stopped."

Arson and "organized crime"

The Minister of Justice stressed that Algerian law provides “greater guarantees” when it comes to felonies, such as “the presence of a lawyer at all stages of the investigation and on the day of trial. Also, all decisions are subject to appeal.”

However, the law stipulates that “a person convicted of committing an act related to fires or child abuse shall not benefit from the mitigating circumstances approved by the Penal Code” and which the judge may estimate, such as reducing the penalty or replacing it with something lighter.

The minister attributed the tightening of penalties to the fact that “setting fires has reached the form of organized crime,” and added that investigations showed “collaboration of criminals with foreign parties, amounting to treason and violating the sanctity of the national territory.”

After its approval in the National People's Assembly, the text moves to the National Assembly, the second chamber of Parliament, for discussion and voting on it before it is signed by the President of the Republic and issued in the Official Gazette to begin its implementation.

France 24/AFP

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