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Accusations of French genocide against Algerians |
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Genocide
against Algerian Identity |
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1. Overview According to the Algerian documents, between 350,000
and 1.5 million Algerians died during the Algerian War of Independence.[1] Algerians argue that the massacres should be named as genocide and France must apologise to the Algerians. Arab states and
many Muslim countries, including Turkey, back the Algerian claims. However
the French do not accept the claims. According to the French side, the number
of killed Algerian civilians is about 350.000, but not more "France's Alledged Algerian
Genocide". French
Foreign Ministry responded to Algerian President Abdulaziz Bouteflika's call
to France to repent for what France perpetrated in Algeria during the
colonial period, by relegating such historical inquiries to historians' "France Left Algerian
Genocide to Historians Again" Algeria's President Abdelaziz
Bouteflika said that
French colonization of his country was a form of genocide.[2][3] In memoirs, some French officers have described
torture of Algerians during the war. Edouard Sablier, for instance, one of
the soldiers who took part in the repression, later described the situation:
"Everywhere in the towns there were camps surrounded by barbed wire
containing hundreds of suspects who had been arrested… Often, when we set out
to inspect an isolated hamlet in the mountains, I heard people say, 'We
should punish them by taking away their crops'."[4] A paper called Ohé Partisans, published by
the French Trotskyists, described Sétif as an “Algerian Oradour”. Oradour was a French town where the Nazi occupiers had
murdered over 600 people, including children.. Some Algerian intellectuals argue that the number of
genocide against the Algerian people is not one but many. Prof. Dr. Ali
Al-Hail for instance
says "French constituted numerous genocides against the Algerians" - The French Definition of 'Genocide'. Similarly, Abdulkerim
Gazali, editor of
the Algerian newspaper La
Tribune, likens
France's occupation of an independent and sovereign Algeria to Nazi Germany's
occupation of many European countries and claimed this was racism "Algerian Genocide - Algerian
History However France has never accepted its responsibility in tortures
and massacres in Algeria. Paris says that the past should be left to
historians. French President Jacques
Chirac, upon harsh reactions to the law encouraging the good sides of the
French colonial history, made the statement, "Writing history is the job
of the historians, not of the laws." According to Prime Minister, Dominique de Villepin, "speaking about
the past or writing history is not the job of the parliament."[5] The
Algerian president Abdelaziz Bouteflika said in a speech in
Paris on 17
April 2006
that "Colonisation brought the genocide of our identity, of our history,
of our language, of our traditions".[6] Algeria first
became a colony of France in 1830. When in 1954 the Algerian
people rioted against the French colonial rule, the French dispatched 400,000
troops to pacify the anti-colonial uprising.[7] The French colonial forces launched an air and ground
offensive against several eastern cities, particularly Setif and Guelma, in response
to anti-French riots. The crackdown lasted several days and according to the
Algerian state left 45,000 people dead YouTube Video -
"Algerian Genocide by France" European historians put the
figure at between 15,000 and 20,000.[8] French attacks continued not only in Algerian
territories but in France as well. The Paris massacre of 1961 was the most
vivid example: On October 17 the French police attacked an unarmed
demonstration of Algerians, who demanded the freedom of their country from
French colonial rule. How many demonstrators were killed is still unclear,
but estimates range from 32 to 200 people. The incident had not been
officially confirmed until 1999.[9][10] The Algerian newspaper Liberté was seized by the
Police on 19 October 1998, presumably in connection of an article about these
events.[11] There
were executions and widespread arrests during the War of Independence.
"Villages were bombed from the air and a town was shelled from a cruiser
at sea. The attacks were more or less random. The point was not so much to
punish the original rioters as to teach the whole Muslim population
to know their place. Settlers set up their own unofficial death squads and
killed hundreds of Muslims. German and Italian prisoners of war were released to take part in the
massacre".[12] As Le
Monde Diplomatique put it, "as France celebrated victory in Europe
on 8 May 1945, its army was massacring thousands of civilians in Sétif and
Guelma - events that were the real beginning of Algeria’s war of
independence."[13] Bouteflika also urged the Paris Government to
admit its part in the massacres of 45,000 Algerians who took to the streets
to demand independence as Europe celebrated victory over Nazi Germany in 1945.[14] French authorities then responded by playing down the
comments, urging "mutual respect" French Foreign Minister Barnier
told Algeria in an official visit to make a common effort to search history
"in order to establish a common future and overcome the sad pages".
Giving interview to El Vatan, an Algerian newspaper, Barnier said that
"Historians from two sides must be encouraged to work together. They
must work on the common past".[15] After
a war which ended in Algeria's independence in 1962, eight million
Algerian residents were deprived of French nationality and hundreds of
thousands of pieds-noirs (French who settled in Algeria and were
re-patriated at the end of the war) were forced "home" to a place
which was not home. Ahmed
Ben Bella also argues that the French committed
a genocide against the people and Algerian culture: "Algeria's
indigenous population was decimated in the early years of French settler
colonial rule, falling from over four million in 1830 to less than 2.5
million by 1890. Systematic genocide was coupled with the brutal suppression
of Algerian cultural identity. Indigenous Algerians were French subjects, but
could only become French citizens if they renounced Islam and Arab culture. A
ruthless policy of acculturation followed, and the remaining Algerians were
forced to cease speaking their native Arabic and use the French of their
colonial masters instead. The indigenous Muslim population of Algeria was not
permitted to hold political meetings or bear arms. They were subjected to
strict pass laws that required indigenous Muslim Algerians to seek permission
from the colonial authorities to leave their hometowns or villages."[16] Abdulkerim
Gazali, editor of the Algerian newspaper La Tribune, likened France's
occupation of an independent and sovereign Algeria to Nazi Germany's
occupation of many European countries and claimed this was racism.[17] Algeria
called on France to apologize in 2005 for crimes committed during the
colonial era.[18] Amar Bakhouche, speaker of the Algerian Senate,
similarly reacted that France did not apologize for massacres it committed in
Algeria.[19] The
archives in France on the issue have been kept closed until now. The French
collected all documents regarding the massacres and genocide. For many, the
closed archives are another sign of the Genocide in Algeria. Amar Bakhouche,
the speaker of Algerian Senate, reacted against the fact that France keeps
the archives related to that period closed. He said the greatest majority of
archives related to that period were brought to France and they were kept
closed. "They are not open for French and Algerians. We urged to
immediately open them for public", he said.[20] In
response to the action of the French parliament, making it an offense to deny
the supposed Armenian genocide, the Turkish parliament
is drafting a bill to make it illegal to deny that the French committed
genocide in Algeria.[21] Turkish party leaders, including CHP, MHP, BBP and
ANAP called France to recognise 'Algerian genocide'.
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