An appeals court in Algeria on Tuesday upheld a five-year sentence for an Algerian French writer who has been accused of undermining Algeria’s national unity and security. The case has strained relations with France, which was once Algeria’s colonial ruler.
The writer, Boualem Sansal, an outspoken author who is critical of Islamic fundamentalism and of the Algerian government, was born in Algeria and became a French citizen last year. In March, a lower court in Algeria convicted him over comments he made that favored Morocco in a territorial dispute with Algeria.
He has been detained for over seven months.
President Abdelmadjid Tebboune suggested in a February interview with the French news weekly L’Opinion that Mr. Sansal was part of a “scurrilous affair designed to mobilize against Algeria.” But France’s Foreign Ministry denounced Tuesday’s court ruling as “incomprehensible and unjustified.”
The ministry, in a statement, urged Algeria to “show clemency and find a rapid, humanitarian and dignified solution to the situation of our compatriot.” French officials, intellectuals and writers have called for the release of Mr. Sansal, who is believed to be about 80 and has cancer. They have characterized the case against him as an arbitrary denial of free speech.
The Algerian president was elected with military support in 2019, and his government has cracked down on political debate and dissent in recent years.
Antoine Gallimard, Mr. Sansal’s publisher in France, told France Inter radio on Tuesday that the writer’s lawyer had been able to see him in Algiers this week.
“He is being treated well and is in fairly good spirits,” Mr. Gallimard said. He added that the lawyer was recommending that Mr. Sansal “accept the verdict in the hope that he may be granted amnesty.”
Mr. Sansal’s lawyer was not immediately reachable for comment. The appeals court in Algiers did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
France was Algeria’s colonial ruler for over a century, until a brutal eight-year war of independence that ended in 1962 — a traumatic history that still shapes relations between the countries. In recent months, tensions have been heightened between their governments, with the two sides criticizing each other and engaging in tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats.
Last summer, Algeria’s government was furious when President Emmanuel Macron of France aligned with Morocco over Western Sahara, a disputed northern African territory that the Moroccan authorities claim but that is facing an Indigenous independence movement supported by Algeria.
Then, in October, Mr. Sansal gave an interview with a French right-wing news outlet in which he endorsed an argument that Algeria had benefited from French colonization, because it gained Western Saharan territory that once belonged to the kingdom of Morocco.
Ségolène Le Stradic and Ephrat Livni contributed reporting.
Aurelien Breeden is a reporter for The Times in Paris, covering news from France.
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