The statements and gestures that punctuated Emmanuel Macron’s visit mark a spectacular turnaround in the climate between the two countries.
For decades, Franco-Algerian relations have been nothing but a succession of periods of tension and reconciliation of varying lengths. The three-day visit that Emmanuel Macron has just made to Algeria has the merit of putting an end to several months of the diplomatic crisis.
Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune and his French counterpart signed a joint statement calling for a “new irreversible dynamic”. If the irreversibility is subject to caution, the momentum seems real and guided by the shared desire to start again on new bases.
Emmanuel Macron’s declarations on an Algerian “politico-military” system accused of maintaining a “memory rent” and his deceptively ingenuous questions about the existence of an Algerian nation before colonization had constituted the high point of the scrambles. This had previously been fueled by French frustrations due to the unwillingness displayed by Algiers on the main issues in progress: immigration, commercial contracts, and memory work.
Progress on the visa issue
The statements and gestures that punctuated the visit of the French president, therefore, mark a spectacular reversal of the climate between the two countries. Even if the substance of the exchanges may have been disappointing in certain respects, the symbol takes on particular importance in the very psychological and emotional context of the Franco-Algerian relationship.
The other significant progress concerns the holding of a meeting at the highest summit of the military and intelligence officials of the two countries. This meeting, unprecedented since independence, augurs well for cooperation in the Sahel, at the crucial moment when France is leaving Mali.
In substance, one of the notable advances relates to the issue of visas. Annoyed by the unwillingness of Algiers to welcome its nationals expelled from France, Paris had decided, in the fall of 2021, to halve the number of visas granted to Algerians. The tension seems to have dropped a notch: France agrees to soften its position within the framework of a chosen immigration, while Algeria undertakes to fight more against illegal immigration.
As for the energy issue, it would have been naïve to expect mountains and wonders from this trip. Due to a glaring lack of investment and strong growth in domestic demand, Algeria’s gas export potential remains limited, and cannot in the short term represent a solution to European supply difficulties, related to the Russian-Ukrainian war.
If this beginning of reconciliation is encouraging, it risks coming up against three limits. The first may come from the conservative fringes of the Algerian regime, which see a dim view of a return to favor of French influence. The second concerns Morocco, which fears that this warming will thwart its autonomy plan for Western Sahara, a subject of contention with Algiers. Rabat nevertheless has means of pressure on Paris by modulating its control of immigration to Europe or its precious cooperation on Islamic terrorism. France thus finds itself caught between the divergent interests of Morocco which has just normalized its relations with Israel and Algeria which feels increasingly isolated.
Third limit, Russia, Algeria’s main supplier of arms, which can demand certain neutrality from it in relation to Western requests, in the context of both the war in Ukraine and tensions in the Sahel. For Algiers, the ridge line is narrow. For the future of relations between France and Algeria, the path is just as steep.
