Placed in detention in Algeria, the Franco-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal is accused of “undermining the integrity of the national territory”, which is considered a terrorist act. He therefore risks life imprisonment, or even the death penalty.
The charges brought against Boualem Sansal on November 26 are particularly heavy. While the 75-year-old Franco-Algerian writer was interviewed on Tuesday by the Algiers anti-terrorist prosecution, around ten days after being arrested on his arrival at Algiers airport, Boualem Sansal was placed under arrest warrant. . He “is today placed in detention under article 87 bis of the Algerian Penal Code which punishes all attacks on state security”, revealed his lawyer in France, Me François Zimeray, whose Le Figaro echoes. As stated by the official Algerian government media, El Moudjahidthe writer is being prosecuted for several charges including that of “attacking the integrity of the national territory”, assimilated to an act of “terrorism”, specifies The World. He therefore risks life imprisonment, or even the death penalty. Note, however, that no executions have taken place for more than thirty years in Algeria.
His supporters did not fail to react this Tuesday evening. On X, French MP Éric Ciotti deplored the news, asking “the Prime Minister to act now to demand the release of one of our compatriots”. And to add: “Freedom of expression is not a crime, it is a right!” For his part, the mayor of Cannes, David Lisnard, estimated in the show Free Spirits that “Boualem Sansal has nothing to do in prison”. For him, Paris must “be able to show that we still have diplomatic influence”.
What are the charges against Boualem Sansal?
In the viewfinder of Algiers, remarks made by Boualem Sansal to the far-right media Borders. In an interview published on October 2, the writer defended the Moroccan position on the very sensitive subject of the border between Algeria and Morocco. Boualem Sansal believed in particular that when “France colonized Algeria, the entire western part of Algeria was part of Morocco: Tlemcen, Oran and even as far as Mascara […]. When France colonizes Algeria, it establishes itself as a protectorate in Morocco and decides, like that, arbitrarily, to attach all of eastern Morocco to Algeria, by drawing a border.” Still according to him, “the regime Algerian, which is a military regime, [aurait] invented the Polisario [le mouvement indépendantiste du Sahara occidental, ndlr.] to destabilize Morocco”. Comments which are part of an already tense context, Paris having recognized on July 30 “Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara”.