Suspected jihadists launched a rocket attack yesterday on an Algerian gas plant jointly run by foreign companies, three years after a deadly hostage crisis at another facility in the Sahara desert.
There were no casualties reported in the attack on a plant operated by Britain’s BP, Norway’s Statoil and Algerian company Sonatrach.
It was the most serious such incident since Al Qaeda-linked militants stormed a complex in Algeria’s remote east in 2013 and began a four-day siege that left dozens dead.
The defence ministry said two homemade rockets crashed near a guard post of a Sonatrach facility in Krechba, 1,300 kilometres  south of Algiers, without causing casualties or damage.
“The rapid reaction of the army detachment tasked with protecting the site foiled this attempted terrorist attack,” it said in a statement posted on the ministry’s website, without elaborating.
Statoil said previously in a statement that the gas asset was hit by “explosive munitions fired from a distance” in the early morning attack.
A processing facility was shut down “as a safety precaution”, BP said.
A plant employee who did not wish to be named said that the site is surrounded by a security fence and soldiers are permanently on guard.
“The rockets seem to have been fired from very far away,” he said.
Military personnel mobilised soon after the rocket fire to prevent the attackers gaining access to the facility, the employee added.
Algeria’s official news agency APS said “two terrorists fired homemade rockets on the gas plant in Krechba,” using Algeria’s official term for militants.
A manhunt was launched to find the attackers, it said.
No group claimed immediate responsibility but militants linked to both Al Qaeda and the Islamic State (IS) group operate in the country.
In 2013, a four-day siege and two rescue attempts by the Algerian army at a gas facility in In Amenas resulted in the deaths of nearly 40 foreign workers and 29 attackers.
The assault — which also targeted a site run by Sonatrach, BP and Statoil — was claimed by Al Qaeda-affiliated militants led by the notorious one-eyed Algerian jihadist Mokhtar Belmokhtar.
The attack prompted a widespread security review in the North African country, heavily reliant on income from gas exports.
The head of Algeria’s army last week called for increased vigilance following what he termed an “unprecedented deterioration” in security.
Algeria has been on guard against jihadist attacks such as those experienced by its neighbours Libya and Tunisia, with local press reporting the deployment of tens of thousands of soldiers along its vast desert borders.
On Monday, a security source said a militant leader who had joined IS was killed during an army operation west of Algiers.
A brutal civil war in the 1990s between the government and militants killed 200,000 people.
Despite adopting a peace and reconciliation charter in 2005 aimed at turning the page on the conflict, armed groups remain active in the centre and east of Algeria.
A total of “157 terrorists, including 10 commanders” were killed or arrested in military operations last year, according to the defence ministry.
Algeria, a member of the Opec oil cartel, is one of the world’s largest exporters of natural gas, with revenue from fossil fuels accounting for 95% of its exports.
It has an estimated 16bn cubic metres of conventional gas and 20mn cubic metres of non-conventional gas, according to Sonatrach figures.