Boualem Sansal remains behind bars. The request for the release of the Franco-Algerian novelist and essayist was rejected this Wednesday by the Algerian justice system, according to information from Le Point confirmed to Le Parisien by his lawyer Me François Zimeray. The 80-year-old writer has been detained in Algeria since his arrest on November 16 at Algiers airport.
The writer, critic of the Algerian power and author of “2084: the end of the world”, was arrested “under article 87 bis of the Algerian penal code, which punishes all attacks on the security of the State”, recalled on Sunday his lawyer Me François Zimeray, mandated by the publisher Gallimard. Boualem Sansal “would have been transferred last Thursday to Kolea prison, 35 km from Algiers,” he added.
Mr Zimeray also said he was “worried about his health and the fairness of a procedure which seems very opaque”. “This incarceration only magnifies his courage which transcends all prisons, escapes all walls,” he added.
Political support on the right
The writer received multiple political and literary support. Several French political leaders, especially belonging to the right and center right, have expressed their concern and support for the writer, known for his freedom of thought, whether against the Algerian power or religious fundamentalism, since he launched into literature in 1999.
“He embodies everything we cherish: the call for reason, freedom and humanism against censorship, corruption and Islamism”, for example launched the former Prime Minister Édouard Philippe on , calling on “French and European authorities to obtain precise information and ensure that he can move freely and return to France whenever he wishes”.
“All means of pressure on Algeria must be activated to obtain the release of our compatriot, the great writer Boualem Sansal,” added the leader of the LR deputies (Republicans, right) Laurent Wauquiez. Marine Le Pen, for her part, asked the French government “to act to obtain his immediate release”, hailing Boualem Sansal as a “freedom fighter and courageous opponent of Islamism”.