At the end of a two-hour interview with the Algerian president, Ms. Rufo also announced that the French sports journalist Christophe Gleizes, detained in Algeria for almost a year, would receive “in the coming days” a consular visit, the first since his incarceration.
Arrested as part of a report in May 2024 in Kabylia, he was sentenced on appeal in early December to seven years in prison for “apologie du terrorisme”. His family announced on Tuesday that he had withdrawn his cassation appeal in March, a move aimed at paving the way for a possible pardon from President Tebboune.
This trip, the second by a member of the French government in less than three months, after that of the Minister of the Interior Laurent Nuñez in mid-February, made it possible to mark a thaw in relations between Paris and Algiers.
Ambassador Stéphane Romatet returned to the country on this occasion, almost a year after being recalled by Emmanuel Macron at the height of tensions.
Année “Useful”
This diplomatic crisis was triggered in the summer of 2024 by the support provided by Paris to an autonomy plan « sous souveraineté marocaine » for the disputed territory of Western Sahara. In this territory with an undefined status according to the UN, for 50 years a conflict has opposed Morocco to the independentists of the Polisario Front, supported by Algiers. Algeria immediately withdrew its ambassador to France.
The crisis worsened with the arrest in November 2024 of the Franco-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal (pardoned by President Tebboune in November 2025) and after the indictment in April 2025 of an Algerian consular agent accused of being involved in the kidnapping in France of an Algerian influencer, Amir DZ.
Alice Rufo was carrying a letter from French President Emmanuel Macron, who is entering his last year in office and wants to make it a year “Useful” for links between France and Algeria.
The interview with Mr. Tebboune was an opportunity to discuss « la coopération de sécurité et de défense », “which is very important in the context†current, “in Africa but also beyond”a-t-elle souligné.
In the morning, she also agreed with the Deputy Minister of Defense, Said Chengriha, the relaunch of cooperation, particularly in the field of the fight against terrorism.
This was never completely interrupted but it also suffered from the crisis between the two countries.
Mali, which shares 1,300 kilometers with Algeria, represents in particular a security issue for Algiers, while the north of this country is a hotbed of instability, with the presence of jihadist groups.
The Algerian president and the French minister also discussed the means « d’intensifier » their cooperation on migration issues. This cooperation had already resumed after the visit of Laurent Nuñez.
They also mentioned « la coopération judiciaire » between the two countries, in particular for the “Fight against drug trafficking”she added.
« Immuniser »
The objective of Paris is to« immuniser » questions of cooperation from upheavals in the domestic politics of the two countries, particularly in the run-up to the French presidential election, according to a French source informed of the matter.
In front of the students of the French high school in Algiers where he accompanied the minister, Stéphane Romatet agreed that it was necessary to tackle “a little work to repair the link which was damagedâ€. “But things are so intertwined (between France and Algeria, editor’s note) that this link cannot be broken.”he judged.
On the memorial level, the Algerian president and the French minister agreed to relaunch the work of the joint commission of historians. Bringing together five French historians and as many Algerian historians, it was created in the summer of 2022 but has not met since the spring of 2024.
Alice Rufo began her journey on Friday with a symbolic stopover in Sétif (east), where she laid a wreath in memory of an independence activist. This city, like those of Guelma and Kherrata, was the scene of a bloody repression by the French army of independence demonstrations from May 8, 1945, causing 45,000 deaths according to Algiers and between 1,500 and 20,000 deaths (including 103 Europeans) according to different sources.
For the historian Benjamin Stora, present in the delegation, “A single gesture will not be enough, it is a whole memorial project (on the French colonization of Algeria between 1830 and 1962 editor’s note), long, slow, complicated and patient that must be implemented.”.
/regions/2026/05/09/69ff3b477ccb7862247374.png "VIDEO. “If you have to go, you have to go”: meeting with these young people ready to join the Army")
