A draft law to condemn the French state for the October 17 heinous massacre

A new draft law, prepared by the representative of the “Proud France” party, Paul Vanier, will soon be presented to the French National Assembly (the lower chamber of the French Parliament), aiming at the recognition by the French authorities of the State’s responsibility for the heinous massacre of October 17, 1961 in Paris, during which hundreds of Algerians were killed while demonstrating in rejection of the discriminatory measures imposed on them alone by other communities.
The legislative initiative was revealed by the representative of the same party, Carlos Martins Belingo, who visited Algeria last weekend as part of his parliamentary efforts to enable Algeria to recover all the skulls of its resistance fighters, In turn, a draft law has been proposed that aims to legislate the return of all the remaining skulls of Algerian resistance fighters, after the partial return of these skulls (about twenty skulls), in June 2021.
On March 28, 2024, the French National Assembly (the lower chamber of the Parliament) adopted a bill proposed by the representative of the “Green” party, Sabrina Sabaihi, condemning the “Paris massacre of 1961” in which more than 300 Algerians were killed on October 17 of that year. Many of them drowned in the Seine River in Paris after being handcuffed by the French police, then led by serial killer Maurice Papon, while demonstrating against the systematic policy of discrimination against them.
Although this law contains some terms and concepts that indicate the responsibility of the French occupier for the suffering and tragedies suffered by the Algerians during the period of occupation, the French authorities were eager to remove the French state from any condemnation for this massacre and to take full responsibility for the murderer, Maurice Papon, a Paris police officer. At a time when the French representatives, led by the Ennahda Party, led by the French President Emmanuel Macron, should hold the French state responsible and not the person of Baboon, who acted as a representative of the state and with the knowledge of its high officials.
This is why the draft law prepared by Paul Vanier, deputy of the “Proud France” party led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, has come to revive the debate on the massacre of October 17, 1961 and seeks to hold the French state responsible for this massacre and not to limit it to a deceased person, in an attempt to close this case once and for all with the disappearance of the person directly involved in it.
In the same context, the deputy Carlos Martins Belingo, who visited Algeria for the second time since last November, is working for the success of his bill, submitted in November 2022 and bearing the number 318, which is also at the level of the lower chamber of Parliament (French National Assembly), which aims to deliver… The remaining skulls of Algerian resistance fighters have been in French museums since the nineteenth century.
According to the French deputy, who was interviewed by the Algeria 24 channel, his project “is nearing its end, and it aims at the complete repatriation of the skulls of the Algerian resistance fighters. This is a process that actually began in 2021 and was limited, without passing the French Parliament, but it requires the adoption of a framework law”.
Therefore, Representative Bilongo believes that the draft law under study “will help facilitate the task of the French government,” which had issued three framework laws, which, as is known, began in January 2023 and June of the same year, before the decree was issued in December 2023. The representative considered that the continued display of these skulls in French museums “is unacceptable in 2024”.
The French deputy’s efforts to make his project a success included raising awareness among French people of different backgrounds in order to confront those who oppose the project and who “try to deny history and practice demagoguery and are motivated by political considerations, including racists and xenophobes,” as he said.