Nicknamed El-Behdja or Alger la Blanche, the city is situated on the west side of a bay of the Mediterranean Sea. Algiers is the capital city of Algeria in North Africa. A civil war which started in 1991 has destroyed much of the country. Algiers is known locally as El-Djazaïr and the residents speak Berber, Arabic and French. In Algiers, most of the interesting sights are in the old part of the city known as the Casbah or Medina.