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AFP
Algiers
Algeria on Sunday buried the remains of 24 resistance fighters returned by Paris after more than a century and a half as it marked the 58th anniversary of its independence from France.
The skulls of the fighters, shot and decapitated in the early years of the French occupation, were laid to rest during an emotional ceremony at El Alia cemetery.
Draped with the national flag, the coffins were lowered into freshly dug graves in the martyr’s square of Algeria’s largest burial ground, alongside national heroes such as revolt leader Emir Abdelkader.
An elite unit of the Republican Guard presented arms while a funeral march played in the background, an AFP correspondent reported.
“This for me is a big day -- a real independence day,” said Yamina, the 83-year-old great grand-daughter of one of the fighters, Mokhtar ben Kouider El Titraoui.
President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, who took part in the ceremony alongside military and civilian figures, has called on France to apologise for its colonial past.
“We have already had half-apologies. The next step is needed... we await it,” he told news channel France 24 in an interview Saturday.
An apology could “make it possible to cool tensions and create a calmer atmosphere for economic and cultural relations”, especially for the more than six million Algerians who live in France, he said.
Tebboune gave the flags that draped the coffins of the fighters to young cadets from military academies, akin to the “passing of a baton” to keep their memory alive among younger generations, an official said.
The president also granted amnesties to 4,700 prisoners to mark independence day, including five linked to the “Hirak” anti-government movement that last year forced the resignation of longtime ruler Abdelaziz Bouteflika, a prisoners’ committee said. Among the remains were those of revolt leader Sheikh Bouzian, who was captured in 1849 by the French, shot and decapitated, and those of his comrades who had met the same fate.
Algiers
Algeria on Sunday buried the remains of 24 resistance fighters returned by Paris after more than a century and a half as it marked the 58th anniversary of its independence from France.
The skulls of the fighters, shot and decapitated in the early years of the French occupation, were laid to rest during an emotional ceremony at El Alia cemetery.
Draped with the national flag, the coffins were lowered into freshly dug graves in the martyr’s square of Algeria’s largest burial ground, alongside national heroes such as revolt leader Emir Abdelkader.
An elite unit of the Republican Guard presented arms while a funeral march played in the background, an AFP correspondent reported.
“This for me is a big day -- a real independence day,” said Yamina, the 83-year-old great grand-daughter of one of the fighters, Mokhtar ben Kouider El Titraoui.
President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, who took part in the ceremony alongside military and civilian figures, has called on France to apologise for its colonial past.
“We have already had half-apologies. The next step is needed... we await it,” he told news channel France 24 in an interview Saturday.
An apology could “make it possible to cool tensions and create a calmer atmosphere for economic and cultural relations”, especially for the more than six million Algerians who live in France, he said.
Tebboune gave the flags that draped the coffins of the fighters to young cadets from military academies, akin to the “passing of a baton” to keep their memory alive among younger generations, an official said.
The president also granted amnesties to 4,700 prisoners to mark independence day, including five linked to the “Hirak” anti-government movement that last year forced the resignation of longtime ruler Abdelaziz Bouteflika, a prisoners’ committee said. Among the remains were those of revolt leader Sheikh Bouzian, who was captured in 1849 by the French, shot and decapitated, and those of his comrades who had met the same fate.
