Minister of Mujahideen starts three-day working visit to France

APS: Tuesday, 26 January 2016 19:08    
PARIS (France)- Minister of Mujahideen (War Veterans), Tayeb Zitouni started, Tuesday afternoon, a three-day working visit to France which will be devoted to three main issues: the archives, the Algerians who disappeared during the National Liberation War and the compensation of victims of nuclear testing in the Algerian Sahara.

During this visit, the first of an Algerian Minister of Mujahedeen made to France, Zitouni will hold discussions with the French minister of Defence, Jean-Yves Le Drian, the Secretary of State to the minister of Defence, in charge of Veterans Affairs and Memory, Jean-Marc Todeschini, the President of the French Senate, Gerard Larcher, and the President of the National Assembly of France, Claude Bartolone

During his visit, he will pay visits to the Army Museum and to Verdun, a small French city located in Lorraine, site of the very deadly battle of Verdun during the First World War (1914-1918), to pay tribute to the 592 stelae of the Algerian combatants who died for France.

The minister will pay tribute, Wednesday, at the Saint-Michel Bridge, to the memory of Algerians killed and thrown in the Seine by the security forces, on 17 October 1961, before meeting with former Mujahedeen settled in France and the French, friends of the Algerian Revolution.

During a press briefing in Algiers, Zitouni said that it is time for Algeria and France to address the pending files, particularly those relating to the national archives, since the beginning of the French occupation of Algeria until the recovery of national sovereignty, to the Algerians who died during the National Liberation War and the compensation of Algerians, victims of the nuclear testing in Reggane.