The crisis between Paris and Algiers reaches a new tension threshold. At the end of an interdepartmental immigration control committee on Wednesday, February 26, François Bayrou announced that France would ask Algiers to “re -examine” the 1968 agreement between the two countries, within four to six weeks.
In this showdown, France has already taken concrete measures. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jean-Noël Barrot, revealed on BFMTV on Tuesday that “traffic restrictions and access to the national territory” have been taken “for certain Algerian dignitaries”. Paris has also announced to provide the Algerian government with a “emergency list” of people considered to be “sensitive” that the French government wants to be taken over by Algeria. Otherwise, the 1968 agreement, which supervises the traffic and the stay of Algerians in France could be “denounced”.
An agreement with many advantages … and disadvantages
But what does this treaty really consist of? Signed on December 27, 1968, the Franco-Algerian agreement grants Algerian nationals a full-fledged migratory status in France, and governed the conditions of traffic, stay and employment in France. Unlike other foreigners, they do not need a long -stay visa and can get a ten -year residence permit more quickly, after only three years of residence (instead of five usually).
The agreement also facilitates family reunification: one year of presence in France is enough to bring in his relatives, which immediately receive a residence permit of the same duration. Algerians can also settle more freely as traders or independent, without having to prove the viability of their activity. In 2023, 615,000 “Algerian residence certificates” were issued.
But this special diet also has its limits. Since their status is governed by this single agreement, they cannot claim other titles created recently, such as the “Talent Passport” or the “Mobility program” student. Algerian students lose: they cannot work, for a student job for example, without requesting a temporary authorization.
“Maintain a regular current of workers”
The agreement, signed six years after the end of the Algerian war, was concluded under the chairmanship of General de Gaulle when France needed labor. In the application decree of March 18, 1969, the approach is justified by the “need to maintain a regular current of workers” which “take into account the volume of traditional Algerian immigration in France”.
Since then, the agreement has been the subject of three revisions in 1985, 1994 and 2001. All led to an amendment. But the main principles of the text were maintained, in particular the regime derogating from ordinary law. Today, Algerians remain the first foreign nationals in France, in number. If the two countries came to break the agreement, the Algerians present in France, would fall into the fold of ordinary law, and would thus be dealing in the same way as other foreigners.
This threat comes in a context of a serious crisis between the two countries, notably after the deadly attack on Mulhouse on Saturday, of which an Algerian national in an irregular situation is accused that, according to Paris, Algeria refused to resume fourteen times.