Foreign Ministry: Algeria Did Not Engage in Escalation With Paris

The French far-right, “known for its hate speech and vindictive tendencies,” is waging a campaign of misinformation and distortion against Algeria, which has not engaged in the logic of escalation, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the National Community Abroad and African Affairs said in a press release on Saturday.

The ministry’s press release read: “The vengeful and hateful extreme right, as well as its patented heralds within the French government, are currently leading a campaign of disinformation, even mystification, against Algeria. In doing so, they believe they have found an outlet for their resentment and frustration”.

“Contrary to what the French far-right, its mouthpieces and its relays claim, Algeria is in no way engaged in a logic of escalation, outbidding or humiliation. It is indeed the far-right and its representatives who want to impose on the Algerian-French relationship their views made up of desires for intimidation, threats and a showdown of which they speak without restraint and nuance”, the ministry explained.

In this context – the statement added -: “The arbitrary and abusive expulsion of an Algerian national from France to Algeria provided this nostalgic part of France with the opportunity to give free rein to its historical score-settling with sovereign and independent Algeria”.

“This opportunity was very poorly chosen. Indeed, the national subject to expulsion has lived in France for 36 years. He has had a residence permit for 15 years. He is the father of two kids born from his marriage to a French national. Finally, he is socially integrated, so far, he has had a stable job for 15 years”, the statement confirmed.

Accordingly, the statement highlighted that “all of these data undoubtedly give him rights that his hasty and contestable expulsion prevented him from asserting his right before both the French and European courts. Consequently, this national was unable to benefit from a proper judicial trial, which constitutes a bulwark against abuse of power, since his expulsion order, if it had been carried out to its conclusion, would have deprived him of defending his rights during the trial scheduled for 24 February of the current year”.

“Furthermore, and in violation of the relevant provisions of the Algerian-French Consular Convention of 24 May 1974, the French party did not believe it was necessary to inform the Algerian party neither of the arrest nor for custody, nor detention nor even for his expulsion of the national in question. Furthermore, it did not respond to the Algerian side’s request to exercise consular protection for the benefit of the national concerned through the right to be visited”, the Foreign Ministry added.

“Given all these abuses and all these violations of the rights acquired by the Algerian national on French territory, the Algerian decision, in this case, is motivated by the concern to allow him to respond to the accusations brought against him, to assert his rights and to defend himself within the framework of a fair and equitable judicial process on French territory”.