Jospin breaks official silence on Algeria despite retaliation fear

FOR the past five years, French politicians have observed an awkward - even fearful - silence about the civil war in Algeria. They knew that no matter what they said they would anger the Algerian government, the opposition, or both.

The kidnapping and murder of Frenchmen in Algeria, the December 1994 hijacking of the Air France Airbus and bombings in the Paris metro were painful reminders that if France took sides, its citizens would pay the price.

But the bloodbath in Algeria this month has raised pressure on French politicians to say something.

And this week, the dam of silence finally gave way.

The Socialist leader, Mr Lionel Jospin, spoke first, saying that France could let the Algerian government - whose human rights violations are documented - know "what we accept and what we don't accept."

Mr Jospin's campaign for a more vocal Algeria policy was a nightmare the French government had been expecting.

It took two years to recover from the damage caused under the previous administration, when the then Interior Minister, Mr Charles Pasqua, launched his own pro Algerian government policy, at cross purposes with the more neutral foreign ministry.

That dispute was largely hidden from the public. Much as the generals in Algiers loved Mr Pasqua, they have reacted angrily to every hint of foreign intervention especially to pronouncements from Paris.

In the minds of President Liamine Zeroual and his military advisers, appeals for dialogue or peace in Algeria are tantamount to calling for a fundamentalist takeover.

In a closed briefing with French parliamentarians on Thursday, the Foreign Minister, Mr Herve de Charette, who visited Algeria in August, told the parliamentary foreign affairs commission in a closed session that the Algiers government "refuse dialogue. They are quick to accuse us of interference or try to drag us into support [for them] that we do not wish to give."

The Algerian Foreign Minister yesterday reacted angrily, saying that Algeria does not want French support.

President Jacques Chirac and his government have concluded that it would be futile to intervene in the Algerian war, which they now expect to drag on for years.

"If we got involved it wouldn't change anything," a high ranking French official told The Irish Times.

"You have to be realistic would mediation be accepted? Between whom the GIA (Armed Islamic Group) and the government? By Frenchmen?" he asked.

"At the same time, we're under pressure from public opinion, so we keep making statements about sympathy for the Algerian people."

The presence of two million Algerians or Algerian born French people in France further complicates matters.

Asked by L'Express magazine about "the shocking silence" of the French government, Mr de Charette replied angrily "What do you want? For the government to tell Algerians what they should do?

"Algeria is not France; that has to be understood and admitted once and for all. It is a sovereign nation. It is up to Algeria to solve its problems, and up to the Algerian people to decide their fate."

Mr de Charette described a bleak situation to the parliamentarians: 150 to 250 Algerians are being killed each week, he said.

This was the first time such high casualty figures have been confirmed. The French government should know with sophisticated scanners in the huge French embassy complex in Algiers, as well as a spy ship with a forest of antennae patrolling the Algerian coast, France is able to monitor the communications of Algerian security forces - and sometimes the guerrillas.

The French Foreign Minister criticised the Algerian President for a hardline speech which, he feared, may have "ended all hope of a political solution" in Algeria.

He also said the creation of militias by the government has worsened the war, by provoking - reprisals from the Armed Islamic Group.

But it was Mr Valery Giscard d'Estaing, the former president and head of the assembly's foreign affairs commission, who created the biggest stir, with his suggestion that the banned Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) should be allowed to participate in forthcoming Algerian parliamentary elections.

Mr Giscard said the vote would be meaningless unless all political forces - including Islamists - participated.

Asked whether he meant the FIS, he said he saw no reason to exclude parties which had stood in the (cancelled) 1991 elections, with the exception of people who had personally committed "terrorists acts.

Although the foreign ministry later disavowed Mr Giscard's statement - in a communique calling for "transparent, fair elections with the representatives of all legal political parties" - the debate has started.

Yet even Mr Giscard supported the French government's new eagerness to see Europe - not France - run the risk of taking Algerian initiatives.

France's attitude "must find its place within a European and Euro Mediterranean demarche," he said. "It's not up to France to initiate an isolated action, 35 years after Algerian independence ... which would risk reopening old wounds that remain painful on both sides."

Fortunately for the French government, Italy has relieved the pressure by promising to propose a European initiative on Algeria on February 3rd.