Algiers Attack is Deadliest Against U.N. Since 2003.

The United Nations suffered its deadliest attack since the 2003 bombing of its Iraq headquarters, when at least 11 workers were killed today by a car bomb detonated next to the world body's offices in Algiers.

The blast damaged offices in the Algerian capital of the UN Development Program and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, agencies focused on fighting poverty. Deputy UN spokeswoman Marie Okabe said at least 11 personnel were killed. A bombing of the Constitutional Council building about 10 minutes earlier in Algiers killed as many as 50 people, most of them students.

"They are beginning to target Westerners and Western interests in Algeria more aggressively," Haim Malka, deputy Middle East program director for the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said in an interview. "They would argue that Western nations are supporting repressive regimes in North Africa and that Western business interests are stealing the region's natural resources."