Tensions between France and Algeria are reaching a new summit after the announcement by Algiers from the end of the free provision of real estate at the French Embassy and the denunciation of a visa facilitation agreement. Algiers accuses Emmanuel Macron of wanting to exempt Paris from his responsibilities in the diplomatic crisis.
What to know
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Algiers accuses Emmanuel Macron of rejecting the entire responsibility of the diplomatic crisis on Algeria in a letter to François Bayrou, and of denying the wrongs of France in the conflict around Western Sahara.
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In response, Algiers denounces the 2013 agreement on diplomatic visas and takes up real estate loaned to the French Embassy, evoking a “considerable review” of leases.
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Paris hardens its migration policy by targeting the Algerians deemed dangerous; Algiers denounces a “blatant violation” of the agreements, while the fear of a total diplomatic rupture is growing.
The Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs accused Macron of having in a letter to his Prime Minister “Do all the wrongs” of this scramble of unprecedented gravity to Algeria.
This text “exempts France from all of its responsibilities” While, according to Algiers, “Nothing is further from the truth”. Relations between Paris and Algiers have been low since the summer of 2024 and the recognition by France of an autonomy plan “under Moroccan sovereignty” For Western Sahara.
The crisis was marked by expulsions of diplomats and officials on both sides and a freezing of all official cooperation. Wednesday, in a letter to his Prime Minister François Bayrou, Mr. Macron stressed that France should be “Strong and be respected”.
Among other measures, he asked the government to suspend an agreement dating from 2013 exempting short -term visas with diplomatic or service passport holders. In response, Algiers announced Thursday “Pure and simple denunciation” of this agreement.
Baux review
In a second press release, the Algerian Foreign Ministry announces that it has informed the business official of the French Embassy of “The decision of the Algerian authorities to end the provision, free of charge, of real estate belonging to the Algerian State for the benefit of the French Embassy in Algeria”.
A verbal note transmitted by Algiers to Paris also announces “The re -examination of the leases, considerably considerable, contracted by the embassy” With public real estate establishments in Algeria, for example, to host French institutes or consulates present in the country.
According to an APS dispatch dating from March, France rents, at very advantageous prices, 61 goods in Algeria including 18 hectares for the French Embassy and 4 hectares for the ambassador’s residence in Algiers. According to the APS, the rent for the embassy is “insignificant” and that of the residence called “Les Oliviers” was of a “Symbolic franc” et “Unchanged between 1962 and August 2023”.
“Particular concern” towards “dangerous” Algerians
Mr. Macron also asked the government to use the “Visa-feedmission lever”which makes it possible to suspend the issuance of long stay visas to citizens of a country whose authorities cooperate “insufficiently” to readmit their nationals in an irregular situation. A measure that Algiers described as “blatant violation” of the bilateral agreements in force.
In his letter, the French president expressed his “Special concern” Towards Algerians “Dangerous, leaving prison or placed in an administrative detention center and which can no longer be expelled, for lack of cooperation from the Algerian authorities”.
He notably motivated his screw turn by the situation of the Franco-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal, detained since November 2024 in Algeria and sentenced on appeal in early July to five years in prison for “Affairs in national unity”. He also mentioned the conviction of sports journalist Christophe Gleizes at the end of June to seven years in prison for “Apology of terrorism”.
“Total rupture”?
Despite his tone hardening, the French president claims to have the aim of “Find effective and ambitious relationships with Algeria”. Thursday, François Bayrou added that France “is not in the minds of a perpetual confrontation” with Algiers with which she would like “One day find balanced and fair relationships”.
But for the Algerian journalist Khaled Drareni, Mr. Macron “slice” : il “Range behind the outrageousness of his Minister of the Interior (Bruno Retailleau, supporter of a hard line, editor’s note) on the Algerian issue, trampling on the hopes of appeasement between Algiers and Paris”.
And in the eyes of the expert Hasni Abidi, director of the Center for Studies and Research on the Arab and Mediterranean World, the letter from Macron “Sign a collective failure in the management of a very expensive crisis for the two countries”. For Mr. Abidi, the decisions of the French president will “Strengthen the option of a total diplomatic rupture”.