Tayeb Zitouni: “We Will Sue France Internationally If It Continues To Refuse Recognizing Its Crimes Against Algerians”

Algeria will sue France internationally if it continues to refuse to recognize its colonial crimes against the Algerians, Minister of Mujahidine (war veterans), Tayeb Zitouni, said on the sidelines of his visit to Sidi Bel Abbes (western Algeria) on Sunday.

“Algeria will take all the means and pursue all the legal means to recover the national memory”, he added.

Tayeb Zitouni confirmed that he had begun to recruit elected, associations and a group of lawyers, to put the file in the international courts, noting that France’s slow recognition of its crimes is an indication of its refusal to do so.

The minister recalled that the file of national memory holds four branches, the first of which concerns the archive which Algeria has received only 2% of it from France since the independence, and it is still distributed to four French bodies the defense, interior, justice, and French national archives.

The second point in the file concerns the nuclear explosions that targeted the inhabitants of the Algerian Sahara, where nuclear radiation continues to cause death in the region, crimes that are punishable internationally, and the third file that was mentioned by the minister concerned the missing during the liberation revolution, confirming that their number reached more than 3000 missing, who were detained in torture centers of the French occupation, and we carry documented lists of the names of those Algerians, while the fourth point of the file is related to the recovery of the skulls of national resistance martyrs in the Paris Musée de l’Homme for more than a century and a half.

The minister concluded by asserting that there is a lack of will and sincere intention of the French side to resolve the file of national memory, and relationships will not be normal with France only if it will settle this file.