A month earlier in Geneva Algeria's Ramtane Lamamra the UN Secretary-General's personal envoy and an experienced mediator had struggled to get the most modest concessions on aid access...

After months of soundings the UN Secretary-General's Representative Ramtane Lamamra led talks in Geneva with RSF and SAF delegations from 11 to July 19...

Blinken who understands the regional sensitivities scheduled his last stopover in Algiers to meet President Abdelmadjid Tebboune and Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra to discuss regional security and deepening economic and trade ties with the US...

The break in relations with Morocco announced by Algeria's urbane Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra on 24 August confirmed the continuation of their cold war – stoked by simmering conflict in the disputed Western Sahara and represented by closed land borders since 1994 (AC Vol 62 No 16 Spy chiefs on manoeuvres)...

Also on the list was senior Algerian diplomat Ramtane Lamamra who this month returned to government for a third spell as Minister of Foreign Affairs...

Former Algerian foreign minister and AU bigwig Ramtane Lamamra's name went into the hat quickly but no Algerian would be acceptable to Morocco or Egypt both of which have considerable clout in the pan-African body...

Others staying on include career diplomat Sabri Boukadoum at Foreign Affairs (where he replaced Ramtane Lamamra in Bouteflika's very last reshuffle) Abderrahmane Raouia at Finance and Mohammed Arkab at Energy...

But it may fail just as an early effort to broker a national unity agreement involving the Deputy Prime Minister Ramtane Lamamra and veteran UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi – who few would deny are two of Algeria's most respected diplomats – quickly came to nothing...