AA / Tunis / Fatma Ben Amor
The detention of the Algerian influencer Boualem N., known under the pseudonym Doualemn, deported to Algeria before being returned to France, was extended by 26 days, decided the judge of freedoms and detention of the judicial court of Meaux, this Sunday during a hearing. Doualemn must be tried on February 24 for “provocation to commit a crime”.
The judge, relayed by BFMTV, considered that “the reason for disturbing public order was well supported by the prefect” and that a release “would have caused a risk to a young and vulnerable public”.
His lawyers immediately announced that they would appeal the decision. They contested, in a press release relayed by Le Parisien, the decision of the Meaux court, “which was rendered in a tense political and diplomatic situation and for which our client is paying the price”. “The issuance of an expulsion order and placement in a detention center must meet legal requirements. Therefore, we are appealing the order of the judge of freedoms and detention before the Court of Appeal of Paris,” they said.
Since last Thursday, Doualemn has been at the administrative detention center (CRA) of Mesnil-Amelot, in Seine-et-Marne. His lawyer, Me Jean-Baptiste Mousset, rejected on Saturday, in a public statement, the accusations brought against his client, ensuring that the alleged facts, in particular comments translated as a call to murder or incitement to hatred, had been misinterpreted. He specified that the investigations carried out under the supervision of the Montpellier public prosecutor had concluded that there was no hateful content or intention to cause harm.
As a reminder, the expulsion last Thursday of the 59-year-old Algerian influencer, arrested in Montpellier for “inciting violence” on TikTok, was immediately refused by the Algerian authorities who sent him back to Paris.
The French Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jean-Noël Barrot, spoke on Friday of retaliatory measures if Algiers “continues the escalation”. In an interview on LCI, he said he was “stunned” by Algeria’s refusal to take back the influencer. Among the options discussed are a review of visa quotas, a reduction in development aid or adjustments in bilateral cooperation. “France will have no other option than to retaliate if this posture persists,” he declared.
For his part, the French Minister of the Interior, Bruno Retailleau, strongly criticized the decision of the Algerian authorities to refuse entry to Doualemn, estimating, during a trip to Nantes, that “Algeria seeks to humiliate the France” and describing this situation as an “extremely worrying threshold”.
In reaction, the Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in a press release, firmly denounced what it described as a “disinformation campaign” led by certain political currents in France, notably the far right, against the ‘Algeria.
“Algeria is, in no way, engaged in a logic of escalation, one-upmanship or humiliation,” affirmed Algerian diplomacy.
“On the contrary, it is the extreme right, its relays and its spokesmen who want to impose on Algerian-French relations their hatred expressed publicly and without the slightest reservation or limit,” we added.
According to the same source, “the extreme right, hateful and vengeful, is leading, through its supporters in the French government, a disinformation campaign against Algeria.”
The Quai d’Orsay in turn reacted to these statements, via its spokesperson Christophe Lemoine. “For some time, the Algerian authorities have adopted a fairly hostile attitude towards France,” Lemoine said on franceinfo on Saturday. “There is no disinformation in this entire sequence,” he added, indicating that France has “reached an extremely worrying threshold with Algeria”, but stressing that the “posture of dialogue (…) still exists in Paris”.
Lemoine remained evasive on the possible steps that France could take to respond to Algeria. “This is a reflection that is underway between the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs, and particularly its Minister Jean-Noël Barrot, and the Ministry of the Interior,” he noted.
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