Whereas, ten days ago, the Algerian president, Abdelmadjid Tebboune, demanded from Paris the “total respect of the Algerian state”, it is now France which calls Algiers to the “respect” of its sovereignty. “The Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs recalled last week France’s deep attachment to respect for Algerian sovereignty. It goes without saying that we also expect all our partners to respect our sovereignty, ”the Quai d’Orsay affirmed on Wednesday.
This statement comes in reaction to the words of the Algerian ambassador to France last Thursday. Mohamed Antar Daoud called on the Algerian community in France to invest in both Algeria and France. “It is unacceptable that Algeria, which has the largest foreign community in France, with 18 consulates, cannot constitute a control lever to intervene not only in Algerian politics, but [aussi] at the level of French policy ”, he had declared on the occasion of a commemoration of the massacre of October 17, 1961.
Unsuccessful attempts at appeasement
These exchanges take place in a tense context between Paris and Algiers, after remarks by Emmanuel Macron reported by the French daily The world who accused the Algerian “politico-military” system of maintaining a “memorial rent” by serving its people an “official history” which “is not based on truths”. Relations between France and Algeria are still haunted by the Algerian war, which pitted the French state against Algerian separatists from 1954 to 1962.
As important anniversaries approach, such as that of the Evian Accords of March 18, 1962, putting an end to the war, Emmanuel Macron has multiplied the initiatives, in an unprecedented step in France to try to appease the memory of this conflict which still affects millions of inhabitants. He commissioned the historian Benjamin Stora for a report on the issue, and made several symbolic gestures towards Algeria, such as the return of the remains of independence fighters from the 19th century or the recognition of the assassination of the Algerian lawyer. Ali Boumendjel in 1957.
On Saturday, the French president denounced for the first time “crimes inexcusable for the Republic”, on the occasion of an official ceremony organized for the 60th anniversary of the massacre, by the French police, of Algerian demonstrators, on October 17, 1961 in Paris.