Overview
- French ambassador Stéphane Romatet attended Friday’s ceremony on Paris’s Pont de Bezons honoring victims of the 17 October 1961 repression at the Élysée’s request.
- According to diplomatic sources, Emmanuel Macron aimed to affirm that France does not forget the 1961 violence and to indicate a desire to overcome the current crisis with Algiers.
- Romatet has been in Paris since April after Algeria expelled twelve French diplomatic staff, and he has not resumed his post in Algiers.
- Relations deteriorated this year over the detention of writer Boualem Sansal and Algeria’s refusal to accept nationals ordered to leave France under OQTF.
- The move drew domestic criticism, with RN leader Jordan Bardella accusing Macron of capitulation, while reporting casts the outreach as a shift following changes at the Interior Ministry.