Algeria has declared three days of national mourning starting Tuesday for the victims of the worst flooding ever, which claimed the lives of at least 580 citizens.
According to state media reports, the number of dead is likely to increase in the coming hours as more bodies are found during continuing rescue operations.
The majority of the victims were from the capital, which witnessed the worst part of the catastrophe, the reports said.
Officials were quoted by AFP as saying that "38 of the victims were killed in Algiers, the majority of them in the working-class Bab El Oued district of the capital which was engulfed by a mudslide on Saturday."
A further 316 people were injured and five were officially reported missing, although that number was expected to climb as the cleanup continued, CNN reported.
A senior official at the territorial development ministry was quoted by CNN as saying that something "like this disaster hasn't happened in 39 years."
Algeria's worst natural disaster since winning independence from France in 1962 was in 1981, when an earthquake killed about 1,500 people.
According to AFP, protests broke out in the area Monday when President Abdelaziz Bouteflika arrived in the scene. Several hundred youths shouted anti-government slogans, including "Assassins in power!" as the head of state emerged from his vehicle.
The youths then headed toward the center of the capital, and were later dispersed by police.
The protests broke out in the capital and other provinces for what the demonestrators called "unfulfilled" governement promises to aid the stricken families.
The government of Prime Minister Ali Benflis came under heavy fire from the press for its apparent failure to cope in time with the disaster - Albawaba.com
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