|
It "was the heart of the nation, not (part) of the colonial empire ... It was integrated into France before Savoie," he said, referring to the Alpine region of eastern France. It took several years for the French to come to terms with the war and for several years referred to the violence simply to "events." Hundreds of French troops were deployed, but the war, which began with an armed insurrection by Algerians, was unwinnable for France. Gen. Charles de Gaulle, who led the French Resistance against the Nazis in World War II, was forced to negotiate Algeria's independence. At a conference at the French Senate last week on Algerian independence, a woman tried to shout down a leading expert on the Harkis, Fatima Besnaci-Lancou, who briefly broke into tears. At the approach of the cease-fire anniversary in March, Algeria's powerful National Organization of Mujahideen, those who fought in the war, tried to re-energize a bill languishing in parliament that would condemn France's colonial past. That bill was an apparent response to a law passed by the French parliament in 2005 requiring textbooks to show the "positive role" France played in its former colonies. Then-President Jacques Chirac later rescinded it. A statement in March by Algeria's National Liberation Front, or FLN, the direct heir of the organization that fought the French
-- and Algeria's ruling party for nearly three decades -- put forth its "immutable position:" France must acknowledge "its crimes against Algerians." At an exhibition hall at the French Army Museum in Paris, under the roof of the gold-domed Invalides where Napoleon is buried, there is a quiet effort under way to own up to one rarely spoken truth. Three photos of the French inflicting torture hang in a corner. One, taken in 1957, shows a naked man strung upside down, hands and feet attached to a wooden plank, and a Frenchman wielding a stick. Part of an exhibition devoted to the French conquest, the war and the evacuation, the photos depicting French torture are a first. The photographer, Jean-Philippe Charbon, refused their publication while he was alive. "We can't recount this history without evoking torture," said Lieut. Col. Christophe Bertrand, one of three curators of the exhibition. This "has followed the French Army to our day. The army has carried the burden," he said. A video showing ghastly scenes of torture of a French soldier by FLN fighters is also on display at the exhibit, showing through the end of July. Highs and lows have marked diplomatic ties between France and Algeria, a major trading partner and strategic ally in the fight against terrorism. But a friendship treaty to make the two countries privileged partners, to be signed in 2005, is still on hold. In Algeria, "This war is still a prisoner of the ideology of the state," making it hard to move forward, or even allow historians to uncover facts, Stora said. What is needed, he said, is a political gesture from France.
[Associated
Press;
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
News | Sports | Business | Rural Review | Teaching & Learning | Home and Family | Tourism | Obituaries
Community |
Perspectives
|
Law & Courts |
Leisure Time
|
Spiritual Life |
Health & Fitness |
Teen Scene
Calendar
|
Letters to the Editor