The two presidential candidates recall that on March 19, 1962, the day of the ceasefire, was followed by many violence. Emmanuel Macron organizes a ceremony at the Elysée Saturday.
Le Monde with AFP
They dispute the calendar. Tour, Friday, March 18, Valérie Pécresse and Marine Le Pen lamented that on March 19 commemorates the end of the Algerian war. Emmanuel Macron must also hold the Elysée a ceremony on the occasion of the sixtieth anniversary of the ceasefire.
Valérie Pécresse is committed to finding another date, and promised if she was elected to hire “a form of memorial reconciliation on the subject. “Clearly, on March 19 does not mark the end of the Algerian conflict. 80% of civilian casualties fell after Evian’s agreements,” she said during a trip to Nîmes. She recalled the shooting of the rue d’Ilyly, Algiers, on March 26, 1962, in which dozens of supporters of French Algeria were killed by the army, or the massacre of Oran of July 5, 1962.
The returnees dispute the reference to the Evian agreements – signed on March 18, 1962 and which led to the implementation of the ceasefire, on March 19 – to commemorate the end of the Algerian war, in because of the violence that continued until the independence of the country, on July 5, 1962, and conclude from the exodus of hundreds of thousands of them to France.
Evoking “Buried wounds that this anniversary revives every year”, M me fécresse said that “we can no longer continue to oppose the memory of those who died for France during the Fights from Algeria and North Africa and the memory of those who have fallen or who have disappeared, in sometimes atrocious circumstances, after the ceasefire “. If “these eight years of war were terrible” and “the unjust colonial system”, it assured that “the French of Algeria and their children are not guilty”. “No, we do not have to, as Emmanuel Macron, accuse them of a crime against humanity that they have not committed,” she said.
“Reconciling by flageling”
In the eyes of Marine Le Pen, “this date was not the end of the Algerian war because there were tens of thousands of Harkis who were savagely murdered”. “If it is a matter of reconciling the memories by flaking in front of Algeria, which continues to claim acts of repentance, as far as I am concerned, it will be no, unless Algeria asks itself forgiveness to the harkis On the way they behaved in their regard, “said France Intercidential Candidate for the National Gathering (NR), former National Front, which was long the refuge of the partisans of French Algeria. Mayors of municipalities Rn or close to the RN disengaged their streets “March 1962”.
Emmanuel Macron placed the Saturday ceremony under the sign of the “appeasement” memoirs and “hand outstretched” to Algeria. “March 19 is a step on this way but it is not the end,” said the presidency. “All the events related to the Algerian war did not end each other overnight with the signing of Evian’s agreements,” conceded the Elysee.
The Parliament had, moreover, definitively adopted in February, by a very broad vote of the Senate, a bill to request “forgiveness” to the Harkis, which paves the way for compensation for certain families.