BERLIN, Aug. 20 -- Synchronized bombings killed 12 people in Algeria on Wednesday, a day after a suicide bomber drove an explosives-packed car into a police academy, killing 48. It was believed to be the deadliest stretch of violence to strike the North African country since its civil war in the 1990s.

Just before dawn Wednesday, a car bomb exploded outside a military command post in the city of Bouira, wounding seven soldiers and a policeman, the Interior Ministry reported. Bouira is about 60 miles southeast of the capital, Algiers.

About 15 minutes later, another car bomb detonated next to a passenger bus outside a hotel in Bouira's city center.

The state-run Algerian Press Service reported that 12 people were killed and 34 injured in the second blast, which targeted contractors working on a nearby dam project. Passengers on the bus were employees of SNC-Lavalin, a Canadian engineering and construction firm based in Montreal. SNC-Lavalin released a statement saying that the 12 dead were all Algerian employees of the company.

Algerian authorities released few other details about the two explosions, including whether suicide bombers were involved. The Algerian Press Service reported that the cars were "booby-trapped" but did not give specifics.

A witness who lives near the military barracks in Bouira told the Reuters news agency, however, that someone intentionally drove a car into the building and died in the attack. "The blast pulverized the bomber's body into pieces, with bits of his limbs strewn meters away," Halim Osbani said.

On Tuesday, a suicide bomber targeted a police training school in Issers, 35 miles east of Algiers. Witnesses said the driver plowed into a crowd of young people lined up outside the academy awaiting the start of entrance exams. Authorities reported that 48 people were killed and 45 injured in that attack.

There were no immediate assertions of responsibility for this week's bombings. But analysts said the attacks were almost certainly sponsored by a group known as al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

The organization used to be known as the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat but changed its name after joining al-Qaeda two years ago.

The Algerian government has played down the threat from the al-Qaeda affiliate, arguing that the insurgency in the country had been severely weakened. But the pace and scale of attacks have risen since April 2007, when suicide bombers struck the Government Palace in the heart of Algiers and a suburban police station, killing 33.

Another major attack followed in December, when two car bombers destroyed a U.N. office complex and a court building in the capital, killing 41.

Dozens of smaller attacks have occurred since then, prompting criticism of the government.

Some retired military leaders have charged that President Abdelaziz Bouteflika has been too accommodating in offering several amnesty and reconciliation programs to Islamist fighters. But on Tuesday, after the bombing in Issers, the Interior Ministry said the government was committed to the amnesty program.

"Algeria will not abandon the law of national reconciliation that has been adopted by the Algerian people, as it has brought peace and calm to the country," the ministry said in a statement.

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