French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez will travel to Algeria next week to discuss several thorny subjects: the case of Christophe Gleizes, a French journalist arrested in May 2024 in Algeria, the admission of Algerian nationals under OQTF, and even intelligence in the fight against terrorism.

Published on: 02/13/2026 - 00:11 Modified on: 02/13/2026 - 09:34

The question of OQTF, the fight against terrorism, the case of Christophe Gleizes: Interior Minister Laurent Nunez will be in Algeria, Monday February 16 and Tuesday February 17, to discuss these thorny subjects in a context of persistent diplomatic tensions between the two countries.

Announced for several months, this sensitive trip was finally confirmed, Thursday February 12, by the minister's entourage to AFP. Laurent Nunez and his Algerian counterpart even spoke at length by telephone in the afternoon to prepare for this visit, expected as a first sign of thaw on both sides of the Mediterranean.

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A few days ago, “France’s first cop” assured that he had received an invitation from his Algerian counterpart and that he would “respond” to it. “We are working on the conditions of this visit,” he explained on BFMTV, welcoming “the fact that security exchanges (have) resumed between the two countries”. He will go to Algeria to "talk about security issues, in particular the question of readmissions, the question of the fight against terrorism, against drug trafficking...", he then detailed.

At the beginning of February, the French minister said he was waiting for an initial response from Algiers to requests from Paris on the return to their country of Algerian nationals in an irregular situation in France and on the case of Christophe Gleizes, this sports journalist arrested in May 2024 while he was preparing an article on the country's most successful football club, JS Kabylie.

France-Algeria tensions have increased

The relationship between the two countries had deteriorated significantly since the summer of 2024 and France's recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara, a territory disputed by Algeria. Franco-Algerian tensions have increased over the past two years, between the kidnapping of Algerian influencer Amir Boukhors - an opponent of Abdelmadjid Tebboune's regime - in April 2024, the indictment of an Algerian consular agent in April 2025 and the expulsion of twelve agents from the French embassy in Algiers a few days later...

Laurent Nunez and his counterpart Saïd Sayoud should also discuss other burning issues, starting with the admission of Algerian nationals under OQTF, intelligence in the fight against terrorism or the extradition requests made to France by Algeria.

“I find that there are positive signals being triggered on both sides,” Sabrina Sebaihi, an environmentalist MP, recently told AFP. "On the one hand, we have the transfer of Christophe Gleizes near Algiers, the Algerian president who says 'I'm taking back all my nationals'. On our side, the Minister of the Interior says 'I'm going to go'. Perhaps we are in a moment of de-escalation of the crisis", further explained the MP for Hauts-de-Seine, who met the President of the National Assembly in Algiers.

Ségolène Royal returns from Algeria

The last trip by an Interior Minister to Algeria dates back to the end of 2022 and the visit of Gérald Darmanin. His successor Bruno Retailleau had crystallized the tensions, regularly attempting to engage in standoff, particularly around the release of the writer Boualem Sansal, imprisoned for nearly a year for certain positions taken on his native country.

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Former socialist minister Ségolène Royal went to Algeria a few days ago, where she was received by President Tebboune and obtained authorization to visit Christophe Gleizes, sentenced to seven years in prison for "apology of terrorism". Ségolène Royal acted as mediator during this visit, initiated in a personal capacity as president of the France-Algeria Association. She had come to plead for a “reconstruction of friendship between France and Algeria”.

With AFP

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