Laura Laplaud
modified to
09:04, August 25, 2022
On the occasion of Emmanuel Macron’s official visit to Algeria, Xavier Driencourt, former French ambassador to Algeria and author of “The Algerian Enigma”, was the guest of Europe Matin on Thursday. For him, “the President of the Republic would like to try to reconcile Franco-Algerian memories”.
Emmanuel Macron begins a three-day official visit to Algeria this Thursday. A trip with several challenges since the Head of State will discuss with his counterpart President Abdelmajid Tebboune several subjects such as gas, Algeria is one of the world’s top ten gas producers. Of visas granted to Algerian nationals, Paris has in recent months halved the number of authorizations. And it will also be about the memory of the fighters. “The President of the Republic would like to try to reconcile Franco-Algerian memories”, observes Xavier Driencourt, former French ambassador to Algeria and author of The Algerian enigma published by the Observatory.
Algeria, “a strategic partner”
“It is important to speak with Algeria because it is an important, strategic partner on the geopolitical level, on the human level as well”, he specifies on Europe 1.
“I find that this is a very difficult moment because we must not forget that Algeria is still diplomatically isolated. It has severed its diplomatic relations with Morocco, it is at odds with Spain. We must not not forget that Algeria is a military-political regime, that there has been very strong repression for two years,” he continued.
“It’s important to speak with Algeria but we have to create the conditions for this trip,” he concluded. Emmanuel Macron will stay in Algeria for three days and will end his first day with a dinner hosted by the Algerian president in the presence of the 90 members of the French president’s delegation, including seven ministers.