FRANCE / ALGERIA: France's Algerian community welcomes Francois Hollande's acknowledgement of 1961 massacre

Record ID: 574131

  • Title: FRANCE / ALGERIA: France's Algerian community welcomes Francois Hollande's acknowledgement of 1961 massacre
  • Date: 29th October 2012
  • Summary: PARIS, FRANCE (RECENT - OCTOBER 22, 2012) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF SAINT MICHEL BRIDGE OVER RIVER SEINE VICE PRESIDENT OF MEDITERRANEAN UNION ASSOCIATION HANDING OUT ROSES AT GATHERING TO REMEMBER VICTIMS OF 1961 PARIS CRACKDOWN ON ALGERIA INDEPENDENCE RALLY T-SHIRTS SHOWING MAP OF ALGERIA IN COLOURS OF ALGERIAN NATIONAL FLAG WITH CAPTION READING IN FRENCH "50 YEARS" VARIOUS OF ASSOCIATION MEMBERS HOLDING IMAGE OF FATIMA BEDDAR, A VICTIM OF THE EVENTS ON OCTOBER 17, 1961 (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) HAMID HEDDAR, EVENT ATTENDEE, SAYING: "My father was in Paris that day. He was protesting like lots of Algerians in Paris. And then in the evening he was arrested by the police. He was taken to the police station and beaten. Lots of people were tortured, many people passed out, there was blood everywhere." MEN THROWING WHITE ROSES INTO RIVER SEINE (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) HAMID HEDDAR, EVENT ATTENDEE, SAYING: "The policemen hit my father in the stomach. They released him. The next morning my father didn't go to work. He spent many days in his room. He was afraid to leave. My father was lucky compared to the others who were killed, who were crammed in the police station like cattle." WHITE ROSES FLOATING IN RIVER SEINE FRENCH HISTORIAN JEAN-LUC EINAUDI WALKING DOWN STEPS TO THE BANKS OF THE SEINE (SOUNDBITE) (French) FRENCH HISTORIAN, JEAN-LUC EINAUDI, SAYING: "From the top of this bridge, on the night of October 17, 1961, police officers threw Algerians into the Seine. Some Algerians drowned. There were witnesses to these crimes. Some witnesses were terrorised by the police as well." COMMEMORATIVE PLAQUE READING IN FRENCH: "In memory of the many Algerians killed by the bloody repression of the peaceful protest of October 17, 1961." (SOUNDBITE) (French) FRENCH HISTORIAN, JEAN-LUC EINAUDI, SAYING: "And such crimes took place on other bridges in Paris and in the Parisian region. These drownings were characteristic of this skilled, savage repression that did not have anything to do with the operations of law enforcement." MEMBERS OF 'UNION OF THE ALGERIAN COMMUNITY IN PARIS,' FORMERLY CALLED THE 'FRENCH FEDERATION OF THE NATIONAL LIBERATION FRONT' WHICH CALLED FOR THE OCTOBER 17 PROTESTS, SEATED IN OFFICE ALGERIAN FLAG BLACK AND WHITE PHOTOGRAPHS OF PROTEST ON OCTOBER 17, 1961 VARIOUS OF MEMBERS OF 'UNION OF THE ALGERIAN COMMUNITY IN PARIS' FLIPPING THROUGH MAGAZINE WITH ARTICLE AND PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE PROTEST POSTER COMMEMORATING 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF CRACKDOWN WITH DRAWING OF ALGERIANS IN RIVER SEINE (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) VICE PRESIDENT OF THE 'UNION OF THE ALGERIAN COMMUNITY IN PARIS', FAOUZI ABDENOUR, SAYING: "October 17, 1961 was a tragic day for France and for Algeria. On this day, the French government disgraced itself by letting the police repress a peaceful protest of Algerians. Millions of Algerians had been waiting for French President Francois Hollande's declaration for a long time. Now we hope that the President's very powerful gesture will cool off the relationship between France and Algeria." SAINT MICHEL BRIDGE ALGIERS, ALGERIA (RECENT - OCTOBER 20, 2012) (REUTERS) VARIOUS STREET SCENES NEWSPAPER REPORTING HOLLANDE'S STATEMENT, HEADLINE READING IN ARABIC "Bold step but not enough" CARTOON IN AL WATAN NEWSPAPER (SOUNDBITE) (French and Arabic) MAN WHO GAVE HIS NAME AS KAMEL, SAYING: "That time I was seventeen years old, I lived the event on the radio, and we suffered a lot and France never wanted to recognise it. But now and with the election of Fran�is Hollande who is a wiser man, he wanted to recognise it, to have a reconciliation between Algeria and France." MORE OF NEWSPAPER STALL HEADLINE READING IN ARABIC "Hollande is offering something with his right hand so he can reap economic benefits with his left" (SOUNDBITE) (French) UNIDENTIFIED MAN, SAYING: "They didn't even recognise it, it took them 50 years to recognise it! Why? Well as long as they did, finally, they recognised it, that's not bad. But they are too late, they should have done it much earlier." (SOUNDBITE) (French and Arabic) WOMAN WHO GAVE HER NAME AS SABRINA, SAYING: "They should have recognised it much earlier, the 17th of October was an event that touched many Algerians and in which many Algerians died. So true, they recognised it, but they did it too late, really too late." (SOUNDBITE) (English) UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN, SAYING: "I don't think that people will forgive them. It's still horrible and people still hurt. I don't think that somebody whose father was murdered - he can't forgive them." MORE OF PEOPLE WALKING IN STREETS POST OFFICE IN DOWNTOWN ALGIERS
  • Embargoed: 13th November 2012 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: France, Algeria
  • City:
  • Country: Algeria
  • Topics: Crime,International Relations,Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA826B5JEN42XT5WA3THVHGS1BU
  • Story Text: On the night of October 17, 1961, in the heat of the Algerian War and in plain view of Paris' police station, hundreds of Algerian demonstrators were attacked by French law enforcement officers -- many thrown off the Saint-Michel bridge where they drowned in the river Seine.
    The demonstrators gathered to protest a curfew imposed on Algerian Muslims by the city of Paris, but were met with brute force by police. The night became known as the Paris massacre of 1961, with death tolls estimated in the hundreds, according to historians.
    After over half a century of official silence from the French government on the topic, French President Francois Hollande gave Franco-Algerians some closure, officially recognizing on October 17 the massacre on behalf of the French Republic and paying homage to the victims.
    The announcement was made on the 51st anniversary of the massacre, as hundreds of people gathered in the French capital to commemorate the 1961 massacre.
    The Mediterranean Union in Paris organised a commemoration of the massacre in which participants threw white roses into the river Seine to pay homage to the victims who had drowned in the river.
    Hamid Haddar, who attended the event, told Reuters Television that his father was arrested and beaten by police officers the night of the demonstration.
    "My father was in Paris that day. He was protesting like lots of Algerians in Paris. And then in the evening he was arrested by the police. He was taken to the police station and beaten. Lots of people were tortured, many people passed out, there was blood everywhere," Haddar said.
    The abuse affected his father physically and mentally for many days, Haddar said, but his father was lucky to have survived relatively unscathed.
    "The policemen hit my father in the stomach. They released him. The next morning my father didn't go to work. He spent many days in his room. He was afraid to leave. My father was lucky compared to the others who were killed, who were crammed in the police station like cattle," Haddar said.
    French historian and specialist of the 1961 massacre Jean-Luc Einaudi said the violence committed by law enforcement officers in plain sight was brutal.
    "From the top of this bridge, on the night of October 17, 1961, police officers threw Algerians into the Seine. Some Algerians drowned. There were witnesses to these crimes. Some witnesses were terrorised by the police as well," Einaudi said.
    "And such crimes took place on other bridges in Paris and in the Parisian region. These drownings were characteristic of this skilled, savage repression that did not have anything to do with the operations of law enforcement," he added.
    Many Algerian authorities and associations in France praised Hollande for his statement, and said they had been waiting for such an announcement for decades.
    Faouzi Abdenour is vice president of the Algerian Community Union in Paris. The group was formally called the French Federation of the National Liberation Front, the group which called for the October 17 protests.
    Abdenour said he hopes the statement will help improve Franco-Algerian relations.
    "October 17, 1961 was a tragic day for France and for Algeria. On this day, the French government disgraced itself by letting the police repress a peaceful protest of Algerians. Millions of Algerians had been waiting for French President Francois Hollande's declaration for a long time. Now we hope that the President's very powerful gesture will cool off the relationship between France and Algeria," Abdenour said.
    In Algeria, reactions to Hollande's move were mixed.
    Algiers resident Kamel said Hollande's recognition boded well for the future of French-Algerian relations.
    "That time I was seventeen years old, I lived the event on the radio, and we suffered a lot and France never wanted to recognise it. But now and with the election of Fran�is Hollande who is a wiser man, he wanted to recognise it, to have a reconciliation between Algeria and France," he said.
    But another resident said the recognition had come too late.
    "They didn't even recognise it, it took them 50 years to recognise it! Why? Well as long as they did, finally, they recognised it, that's not bad. But they are too late, they should have done it much earlier," said an unidentified man.
    "They should have recognised it much earlier, the 17th of October was an event that touched many Algerians and in which many Algerians died. So true, they recognised it, but they did it too late, really too late," said Algiers resident Sabrina.
    Other Algerians questioned the ability of the victims' families to come to terms with the massacre even after Hollande's gesture.
    "I don't think that people will forgive them. It's still horrible and people still hurt. I don't think that somebody whose father was murdered - he can't forgive them," said an Algerian woman who did not disclose her name.
    Any suggestion that the French authorities were to blame for the massacre remains a highly sensitive issue, particularly among Hollande's right-wing opponents.
    Many historians say the massacre was the deadliest use of force by French authorities on home soil since police helped to round up thousands of Jews and other minorities during the 1940-45 Nazi occupation.
    In the months and years following the massacre, the government banned publication of a book about the killings and suppressed the few photographs taken by journalists that night.
    Historians have compiled witness reports of protesters being chased through the streets of Paris and bludgeoned to death in the courtyards of police stations. Bodies were thrown into the Seine river, witnesses said.
    Research was hampered by the fact that police documents from the time were never opened to the public. As a result, there is still no consensus on the number of deaths.
    Algeria celebrated 50 years of independence from France in July. Paris was its colonial master for 132 years and only let it go after the trauma of the 1954-1962 Algerian war.
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