French officials are keen to play down the 50th anniversary of the ceasefire that ended the deadly conflict of the Algerian war but its legacy has reared its head in the run-up to France’s April-May two-round presidential vote.
France remains divided over how to mark the Algerian war which threatened to tear its society apart. For years, rival factions have commemorated their own victims, including pro-independence protesters killed in Paris in the 1960s.
France only recognised the Algerian conflict as a “war” in 1999.
The signing of the peace agreement between France and the Algerian National Liberation Front in the French Alpine resort of Evian on March 18, 1962, was approved with a 90 per cent majority in a French referendum the following month.
Hoping to make gains on the right, President Nicolas Sarkozy has reached out to the community of European-descended Algerians, known as “pieds noirs”, who fled the country after the war and still make up a powerful voting bloc.
And on the fringes of the campaign, Left Front candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon has accused far-right National Front founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, whose daughter Marine is running third in the polls, of having “blood up to his elbows” for having served as an intelligence officer during the war.
The anniversary will mark the signing of accords in 1962 with Algeria’s National Liberation Front (FLN) that ended a more than seven-year conflict that saw Algerian nationalists rise up against and eventually defeat their French colonial rulers.
The conflict saw brutal atrocities on both sides, but French forces have particularly been criticised for the systematic use of torture against Algerian fighters and civilians.
With these bitter memories − amid concerns about present-day relations with Algerian authorities − French officials say there will be no official ceremonies to mark the anniversary.
“We must avoid fanning the flames,” a French diplomat said on condition of anonymity. “Our concern is to avoid any outbursts in a very volatile context,” the diplomat said, noting that as well as the French presidential election, Algeria will be heading to the polls for a legislative vote on May 10. But that hasn’t stopped the war from playing a role in the French vote.
In a speech earlier this month, Mr Sarkozy spoke at length of the “nightmare” endured by pieds noirs when they were forced to choose between “the suitcase or the coffin”. The group and their descendants account for an estimated 3.2 million voters who have traditionally backed either the right or far-right.
Mr Sarkozy, who is trailing Socialist candidate François Hollande in the polls, reached out also to voters among the so-called “harkis” − the up to 200,000 Algerians who fought for the French during the war.
Nearly half of them fled to France after the conflict, but the government initially refused to recognise their right to stay in the country and many ended up in internment camps.
Mr Sarkozy has denounced the “injustice” of their fate and their “abandonment” by French authorities. But he insisted that France will not “repent” for the Algerian war.
“There were abuses,” during the war of 1954 to 1962, the President told a local newspaper. “Atrocities were committed by both sides. These abuses, these atrocities have been and must be condemned but France cannot repent for having conducted this war,” he added.
Two days later, Algeria’s Minister of State Abdelaziz Belkhadem, who also leads the National Liberation Front party, said France will ultimately have no choice but to apologise.
“Whether President Sarkozy accepts it or not, the day will come that France will apologise for what it has done in Algeria,” Mr Belkhadem told journalists.
The war also came to the fore in a vicious exchange between Mr Melenchon and Mr Le Pen after Marine Le Pen refused to hold a televised debate with the far-left candidate.
After Mr Le Pen senior accused the Communists, part of the coalition backing the Left Front candidate, of having blood on their hands, Mr Melenchon shot back that Ms Le Pen’s service in Algeria had left him with “blood up to his elbows... the blood of a torturer”.
For its part, Algiers has announced an anniversary bash for July 5, the day it celebrates its independence from France. Algerian historians today talk of 1.5 million Algerian victims of the war while their French colleagues put the total number of deaths for both sides at 400,000.
Relations between the countries have zigzagged since then as the war remained an emotive issue. From an Algerian point of view, the French campaign has taken on anti-Islamic tones at a time that North African and Muslim communities in France feel victimised by discussions on limiting immigration and practices such as halal butchery.
On May 10, Algerians, including an estimated 800,000 listed on voters’ rolls in France, will elect a new Parliament.