Algeria says France will ‘inevitably’ admit its colonial crimes

By Abbas Mimouni and Betul Yilmaz

ALGIERS, Algeria / ISTANBUL (AA) – Algerian Interior Minister Brahim Merad said on Thursday that France will “inevitably” admit its colonial crimes in the North African country.

"There is awareness among some philanthropists in France that the crimes committed by France’s colonial rule (1830-1962) during the revolution (1954-1962) did not happen anywhere else before,” Merad said during a ceremony marking the 80th anniversary of the May 8, 1945 massacres committed by the French colonial authorities.

In the massacres of 1945, France killed 45,000 peaceful demonstrators while demanding independence from France after Algerian support for it during World War II.

“French and Algerian historians had found out that the colonial crimes committed in Algeria were unprecedented in other regions of the world,” the minister said.

He pointed out that there is an increasing awareness among the French people that will obligate “France to admit its colonial crimes that it committed in Algeria.”

"The heinous crimes committed on May 8, 1945, were among the factors that expedited the outbreak of the revolution of November 1, 1954."

Historical sources indicate that the 1945 massacres lasted more than 40 days, during which colonial forces employed brutal suppression methods, including mass executions.

This year’s commemoration comes amid escalating tensions in Algerian-French relations, which have reached the level of reciprocal ambassador withdrawals and diplomat expulsions amid ongoing disputes over memory and colonial history.