Emmanuel Macron. Credit line: Ludovic MARIN / AFP / Profimedia
The Algerian parliament on Wednesday unanimously adopted a law that criminalizes French colonization (1830-1962) and requires France to present an “official apology”, a measure with a strong symbolic impact that could exacerbate tensions between the two countries, reports AFP, taken over by Agerpres.
Standing in the hemicycle, the deputies, wearing scarves in the colors of the Algerian flag, applauded the passage of the text that imputes to the French state “the legal responsibility of its colonial past in Algeria and the tragedies it created”.
It presents the “crimes of French colonization”, considered imprescriptible: “nuclear tests”, “extrajudicial executions”, “practice of physical and psychological torture” on a large scale and “systematic looting of wealth”.
The President of the National People's Assembly, Brahim Boughali, welcomed the unanimous approval of the law by those present. The law stipulates that “a full and fair compensation for all the material and moral damages produced by the French colonization is an inalienable right for the Algerian state and people.”
Despite the law's symbolism, its actual impact on reparations claims may be limited. “From a legal point of view, this law has no international impact and therefore cannot bind France,” Hosni Kitouni, a researcher in the history of the colonial period at the British University of Exeter, commented to AFP. But “it marks a moment of rupture in the memorial relationship with France”, he appreciated.
Asked last week about this vote, the spokesman for the French Foreign Ministry, Pascal Confavreux, said he did not want to comment “since it is about political debates that take place in foreign countries”.
This weekend, Brahim Boughali gave assurances that this approach “does not target any people, does not seek revenge or sharpen resentments”.
The vote comes at a time when Paris and Algiers are in a diplomatic crisis that continues, following the recognition by France, in the summer of 2024, of an autonomy plan “under Moroccan sovereignty” for Western Sahara.
Several episodes have since aggravated tensions, such as the conviction and imprisonment of the French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal, who was eventually pardoned following a German intervention. The issue of French colonization in Algeria is a very sensitive subject, which remains one of the main sources of tension between Paris and Algiers, AFP notes.
