Relations are heating up between Paris and Algiers. Six weeks after Emmanuel Macron’s visit, Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne spent two days in the Algerian capital. At the end of her first trip abroad, Monday, October 10, she welcomed in the afternoon the construction of “a renewed partnership, inscribed in the long term”. Accompanied by fifteen ministers, the head of government had been welcomed the day before by her counterpart, Aïmene Benabderrahmane.
The meeting was mainly aimed at building a new economic link between the two countries and displaying their close collaboration, while the war in Ukraine and the tension on the gas market it maintains have put Algiers back at the center of Paris’s concerns. Several files such as the question of memory or that of the attribution of visas to Algerian nationals were mentioned but the discussions focused, on the whole, on commercial issues.
“I have the feeling that, together, we have moved forward,” rejoiced Elisabeth Borne. A symbol of the relaunch of dialogue between the two countries: the respective governments sat around the table of the High-Level Intergovernmental Committee (CIHN), a first since 2017. This meeting of the CIHN, attended by around fifteen ministers from each countries, has led to the signing of 12 industrial, technological, educational and cultural cooperation agreements, the majority of which, however, turn out to be declarations of intent.
In the wake of these agreements, the heads of government inaugurated a Franco-Algerian business forum in order to stimulate “a new dynamic” in exchanges. Closing Tuesday, this rout should welcome nearly 70 French companies including Sanofi, the pharmaceutical giant carrying an insulin factory project on Algerian soil. Four SMEs completed the French delegation: Générale Energie (recycling), Infinite Orbits (micro-satellite), Neo-Eco (waste) and Avril (food industry).
“Welcome to French investors in Algeria”, launched the Algerian Prime Minister, Aïmene Benabderrahmane, to the tricolor representatives. Algeria is France’s second largest trading partner in Africa. According to Algerian customs in 2020, France is the country’s second largest supplier after China, and its second customer just behind Italy. Paris is also the second largest investor in Algeria, according to the IMF, with 500 companies established in the country, which represents 40,000 direct jobs.
Upon her arrival on Sunday, Elisabeth Borne hastened to lay a wreath at the Monument des Martyrs, a high place of Algerian memory of the war of independence against France. She also prayed in the Saint-Eugène cemetery in Algiers, where many French people born in Algeria are buried. A memorial gesture filled with symbolism that is not insignificant as the establishment of a commission of historians aimed at ironing out memorial tensions is taking shape.
During his visit to Algeria, Emmanuel Macron had promised the creation of a body made up of researchers from the two countries in order to study the period of colonization and the war in Algeria. “We discussed names and we are in the process of stabilizing the composition,” notified the head of government. The appointment of this commission is only a “matter of a few days”.
On the delicate issue of visas, Elisabeth Borne reported “intense exchanges” between the French Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, and his Algerian counterpart. She says she is “confident that they will emerge quickly”. Paris had announced at the end of September the tightening of the conditions for granting visas to Algerian nationals. A 50% reduction in the number of visas is targeted. France thus hopes to put pressure on Algeria to take back its nationals who arrived illegally on French territory.
The Prime Minister at the same time affirmed that the question of gas was not on the menu of the discussions. Elisabeth Borne says she wants to “continue to move forward” with Algeria to increase its production capacities and promises “regular visits and exchanges at the economic, political and technical levels”.
