Relations between Algiers and Paris have grown more complicated, being in open crisis for the past four and a half months. The French Ambassador to Algeria, Stéphane Romatet, was summoned to the Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, according to the government daily El Moudjahid on Sunday, December 15, citing “credible diplomatic sources.”
The diplomat was summoned to convey “the firm disapproval of Algeria’s highest authorities regarding the numerous provocations and hostile French acts directed towards Algeria,” the same source added.
El Moudjahid explains that the summoning of Stéphane Romatet followed “serious revelations about the involvement of French intelligence services, the DGSE, in a campaign to recruit former terrorists in Algeria for destabilization purposes.” The newspaper mentions the example of a man named Mohamed Amine Aïssaoui, who recently spoke to the public television channel AL24 News.
“Absolute Firmness”
At the Foreign Ministry, the newspaper continues, the French ambassador was informed with “absolute firmness” that “such actions would not go without consequences.”
“Resolved to preserve its dignity, Algeria will take all necessary measures to counter these attempts at interference,” El Moudjahid sources specify, adding that “Algeria thus warns that it will not remain passive in the face of these incessant attacks on its sovereignty.”
Algeria recalled its ambassador from France at the end of last July following Paris’s decision to recognize “Moroccan sovereignty” over Western Sahara.
French Ambassador Summoned: Crisis Worsens Between Algiers and Paris
The crisis was exacerbated by the arrest in Algeria of the Franco-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal in mid-November.
Regarding this case, El Moudjahid denounces “an unusually intense media offensive,” “a methodical bombardment against our country,” and “outrageous and deeply disrespectful remarks towards Algerian officials by certain French personalities,” naming “the bloodthirsty of Paris,” Bernard-Henri Lévy.
This episode adds to “the long list of unfriendly gestures towards Algeria,” writes the Algerian newspaper, recalling “the lack of cooperation regarding members of the terrorist groups MAK and Rachad, which Paris actively protects and supports,” “the seizure of weapons and ammunition from France at the port of Béjaïa,” and the regular provocations by a former French “ambassador” to Algeria (Xavier Driencourt).
“This campaign, marked by overt hostility, goes beyond the bounds of what is acceptable,” El Moudjahid judges, stating that “this recall is therefore a strong political signal that informs public opinion and signifies above all that Algeria is adopting an approach that remains within the formal framework of diplomatic relations.”
While questioning the sponsors and objectives of these “media-political squadrons,” the government daily reports an “obsessive, pathological anti-Algerian sentiment” and wonders if the intent might not be to “divert attention from internal crises in France by making Algeria a scapegoat in a shameless strategy of diversion.”
