French-algir writer closed over Morocco’s comments

The Algerian court sentenced an 80-year-old writer to five years in prison after accusing him of undermining the territorial integrity of the country.

Boulem Sansal was arrested last year after in an interview with a far -right French media that during the colonial era, France was giving too much land to Algeria and too little to Morocco.

He had also said that the controversial territory of West Sahara was a historic part of Morocco.

During his detention, the French-algier author spent time in a hospital for poor health.

His case caused a wave of support from intellectuals and politicians, including the author of the Nobel Nobel Prize, Voulate Sitka and French President Emmanuel Macron.

“The arbitrary retention of Boulem Sansal, at the top of his anxious health, is one of the elements that must be settled before confidence (between our countries) is fully restored,” Macron said in February.

The writer finds himself at the center of a deep diplomatic order, according to his friends.

“He has inadvertently become a pawn in problematic relations between Paris and Algeria,” a committee of his supporters in France recently said.

Algeria was once appreciated by a French colony and waged a war of independence, eventually winning its sovereignty in 1962.

Relationships have long been strained between the two countries, but reached a new low last year when France supported Morocco’s request to West Sahara, where Algeria supported the Polisario group struggling for independence in the territory.

Algeria responded slightly by withdrawing his ambassador to Paris.

Three years earlier, Algeria divided diplomatic ties with Morocco.

Following the court’s ruling on Wednesday, Sansal’s lawyer pleaded before Algeria President Abdelmajid Wibun to show the “humanity” to the writer.

Sansal is well known for his anti -IlSlastic views and is an outspoken critic of the Algerian government.

His offenders say he is a favorite of the far right ones who soothe their prejudices.

The end-the-right French leader Marin Le Pen called Sansal “a fighter for freedom and a bold opponent of Islamism.”

Earlier, his age was reported as 75, but his publishers Galimard say he is actually 80.

Sansal’s most famous works include 2084 – satire for religious radicalism, which won the Grand Prix at the French Academy of Francophone a decade ago.

His next novel, Vivre, must be published in May and tells the story of a selected group of people who are selected to colonize a new planet such as Apocalypse on Earth.

Additional reporting from Marcus Erbe