ALGIERS, Algeria, May 24 (UPI) -- Algerian newspapers are reporting that a total of 42 people, including women and children, have been killed or found dead in less than a week in the north African country. They quote security sources as saying that five more were killed in the capital's suburbs on Saturday by suspected Muslim militant gunmen. The papers quoted security sources as blaming the massacres on suspected Muslim militant gunmen who have been involved in a war with the government since the army canceled the 1992 general elections that the Islamists were winning. The sources said a total of 19 villagers, members of two families that included six children, were killed on Wednesday and Thursday in the provice of Medea, 120 kms (74 miles) south of the capital. Also on Wednesday, police found the decapitated bodies of 18 people, including women and children, near the town of Jelfa, 275 kms (170 miles) south of Algiers. Algerian violence has claimed the lives of more than 70,000 people since 1992 and the government has put the sole blame on Muslim militant ``terrorists.'' But mainstream Islamic groups, most of which are banned in the country, insist their members are not responsible for the violence against civilians. Some of these groups, as well as other secular opposition political activists, have blamed the army or ``foreign elements conspiring against Algeria.''  