Abdelhak Layada (1959-) was one of the founders of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA) and its leader from 1992 to 1993 during the Algerian Civil War.
Biography[]
Abdelhak Layada was born in 1959 in Baraki, Algiers, Algeria to a family of Sunni Muslim Berbers, and in 1988 he was a paramedic during the bloody 1988 October Riots. On 31 August 1992 he helped in the foundation of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA) at the start of the Algerian Civil War, but on 10 July 1993 he was captured in Morocco while trying to acquire weapons. In 1994 he was sentenced to death, but in 2006 President Abdelaziz Bouteflika released him during a campaign of national reconciliation. In 2009 a bomb was found in front of his home, but it was disarmed.