Algeria is commemorating the 63rd anniversary of the French police’s fatal crackdown on protesters calling for Algeria’s independence from France who were demonstrating in Paris.
For decades, French officials concealed the extent of the atrocity, which claimed the lives of dozens of unarmed protesters.
President Emmanuel Macron called it “inexcusable” in 2021, but he made no apology or promise of compensation.
Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune stated in a statement on Wednesday that the day “remains deeply engraved in our minds” in front of the 63rd anniversary.
“Moments of madness devoid of all civility and humanity” is how he characterized the murders.
“On this occasion, I bow with piety and deference to the memory of the victims of that sinister day,”
Uncertain death toll
Algerian protesters were assaulted, killed, or thrown into the Seine River, where they drowned, during the evening of October 17, 1961, and in the days that followed.
It has never been clear how many people were killed. The French government reported 40 fatalities in 1998.
Historians and activists, however, think the violent police crackdown murdered hundreds of Algerians.
The demonstrations took place during the last year of France’s bloody campaign to keep Algeria as a colony in North Africa.
A resolution denouncing the murders as “bloody and murderous repression” was accepted by the lower chamber of the French parliament in March 2024.
Protesters still denounce France for its 132-year cruel colonial rule and its refusal to “apologise or repent” for the slaughter.