Algeria’s parliament has passed with full support a piece of legislation stating France’s colonisation of the country a crime and called for an official apology and compensation.
Legislators, standing in the chamber adorned with scarves in the colors of the Algerian flag, chanted “vive l'Algérie” on Wednesday as they celebrated the approval of the legislation, which affirms that France holds “accountability for its colonial past in Algeria and the tragedies it caused”.
A Diplomatic Strain and a Political Move
The two countries are embroiled in a significant diplomatic crisis and observers note that while Algeria’s action is mostly gestural, it is still a major political statement.
“a clear message, both internally and internationally, that the nation's historical memory is not erasable nor subject to negotiation.”
The legislation lists the “crimes of French colonisation”, which include nuclear tests, extrajudicial killings, “torture” and the “systematic plundering of national wealth”.
Call for Reparations
It asserts that “full and fair reparation for all material and moral damages caused by French colonisation is an fundamental entitlement of the state and its people”.
France’s rule over Algeria from the 19th century until independence was a period marked by mass killings and forced displacements, all the way up to the bloody independence war from the mid-1950s to 1962.
- Algerian officials says the conflict killed one and a half million lives.
- Historians in France put the death toll at half a million in total, 400,000 of them Algerian.
French Reaction and Historical Perspective
The head of state, Emmanuel Macron, has in the past recognized the colonial era of Algeria as a “crime against humanity” but has stopped short of an official apology.
Questioned recently about the vote, a French foreign ministry spokesperson said he would not comment on “political debates taking place in other nations”.
A researcher in the history of colonisation, commented that “from a legal standpoint, this law has little international force and therefore is not binding for the French state”. However, “its diplomatic and emblematic importance is considerable: it marks a rupture in the ties with France in terms of memory,” he said.
