ALGIERS, Algeria: French Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin visited Algeria on Monday, signalling a major thaw in relations and the restart of judicial cooperation between Paris and Algiers.
Ties between France and Algeria have been fraught since 2024, when Paris backed Moroccan sovereignty over the disputed Western Sahara, where Algeria supports the pro-independence Polisario Front.
In Algiers, Darmanin met with President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, with whom he held “a very long exchange” as they discussed “rebuilding trust,” the French minister said in a closing address.
Christophe Gleizes, a prominent French sports journalist, at an unknown location. (AFP)
The visit also formally resumed judicial cooperation between the two countries after “two years of total interruption,” Darmanin’s office told AFP in a statement.
Tensions between Paris and Algiers worsened in 2024 over the arrest of French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal — who was pardoned last November — and in April 2025 when an Algerian consular official was charged in France over the alleged abduction of Algerian online influencer and government critic Amir Boukhors, better known as “Amir DZ.”
But France and Algeria agreed in February to restart security cooperation when Interior Minister Laurent Nunez visited Algiers, marking the first sign of a warming in diplomatic ties.
France’s ambassador to the North African country, a former French territory, returned to his post earlier this month after being recalled about a year ago at the height of the dispute.
While both countries show signs of a improved relations, one unresolved issue remains the detention of French sports journalist Christophe Gleizes in Algeria on terror charges.
Gleizes, 37, was arrested in May 2024 while traveling to northeastern Algeria’s Kabylia region to write about the country’s most decorated football club, Jeunesse Sportive de Kabylie.
Gleizes was sentenced in June last year to seven years in jail for “glorifying terrorism” after being accused of having been in contact with members of the Movement for the Self-Determination of Kabylie (MAK), a foreign-based group that Algiers has designated a terrorist organization.
On Monday, he received his first visit from a diplomat since his detention.
His family has said Gleizes withdrew his appeal to Algeria’s highest court, a move seen as opening the way for a presidential pardon.
