“Algeria does not respect the right” by not accepting on its soil one of its expelled nationals from France, accused this Tuesday, February 18 on TF1, the French Minister of the Interior Bruno Retailleau, who envisages sanctions against the Air Algeria Company. According to French judicial sources, Algiers refused to admit on his soil one of his 30-year-old nationals, sentenced in May by the Thonon-les-Bains court (Haute-Savoie) to six months in prison and a ban of territory for several facts including theft, concealment and port of stabbing weapons.
“If the Algerian did not have an identity card or bionuméric passport, I understand that a consular pass,” said the minister. “But there, the document is recognized. It is Algerian. So Algeria breaks the law. I asked my services to see under what conditions one could sanction” the national company Air Algeria, “he added. “We are seeing the whole scale of the possible response.”
As the maximum retention period approaches, the Algerian national was embarked, escorted by police officers, aboard a flight for Algeria, who landed in Oran on the night of February 10 to 11. Although he has an identity card in the process of valid, the Algerian authorities refused to admit it on the grounds that he had no consular pass, and he was immediately sent to France, according to These court documents.
“Weakness” vis-à-vis Algeria
In a note to his services, consulted Monday by AFP, the Minister of the Interior took note of an “additional and new requirement” of the national company Air Algeria which “derogates from the agreements” between the two countries. From now on, the company “requires consular pass even when the individuals planned at the start are holders of valid identity documents”, underlines the minister’s office.
“Why does France show such a great weakness towards Algeria? I think that it is necessary (…) to put a balance of power,” said Bruno Retailleau, evoking , among the possible means of pressure, the fact of “depriving a certain number of personalities, of the nomenclatura, of diplomats” of the “facilities” which they currently benefit from.
France can also “more general question agreements,” he added. “From the moment when Algeria does not respect the agreement with France and international law, why would we oblige ourselves to respect the agreements with Algeria?”