France Committed Genocide In Algeria

"More than 1,5 Million Algerians Were Massacred Under The French Rule"

By Jan Soykok
Thursday , 20 April 2006
TurkishWeekly

Algeria's president Abdelaziz Bouteflika has said that French colonization of his country Algeria was a form of genocide. In memoirs, some French officers have described torture of Algerians during the war, however France has never accepted its responsibility in tortures and massacres in Algeria. Paris says that the past should be left to historians. More than 1,5 million Algerians were massacred under the French rule.

"This wasn't only a genocide against the Algerian people but also a genocide against Algerian identity," Algerian President said.

The Algerian president Bouteflika said in a speech this week:

"We no longer know whether we are Berbers (indigenous North Africans), Arabs, Europeans or French". France committed a "genocide of Algerian identity" during the colonial era," he said.

Bouteflika also said:

"Colonisation brought the genocide of our identity, of our history, of our language, of our traditions."

French-Algerian relations had been tenser since France passed a law last year requiring textbooks to show the "positive role" the country played in its former colonies.

...Algerian President Bouteflika had equated France's law with "mental blindness" and revisionist history.

...Algeria last year called on France to apologise for crimes committed during the colonial era. Bouteflika also urged Paris to admit its part in the massacres of 45,000 Algerians who took to the streets to demand independence as Europe celebrated victory over Nazi Germany in 1945.

...The 1954-1962 war of independence cost the lives of 1.5 million Algerians, according to the Algiers government.