GOVERNMENT BLASTS INTERNATIONAL NGOS, DEFENDS

C O N F I D E N T I A L ALGIERS 001773

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/10/2017
TAGS: PGOV PHUM AG
SUBJECT: GOVERNMENT BLASTS INTERNATIONAL NGOS, DEFENDS
BOUTEFLIKA'S NATIONAL RECONCILIATION PROGRAM


Classified By: Ambassador Robert Ford, reason 1.4 (b) and (d)


1. (U) The Algerian government used the occasion of World
Human Rights Day on December 10 to justify President
Bouteflika's National Reconciliation program while slamming
international NGOs and domestic opponents for hiding behind
victims of government abuses to launch political attacks
against the government now. At a conference called by the
president of the National Human Rights Promotion Council,
Farouq Ksentini, the Presidency's Counter-Terrorism advisor
Kemal Rezag-Bara said the reconciliation program aimed at
restoring peace in Algeria, and as such it was consistent
with the introduction to the international human rights
declaration. Rezag-Bara stated that the Algerian state was
fighting extremists who were using the 1991 halt to the
election process as an excuse to impose by force radical
principles on the society. Some international NGOs, he
observed, lacked the objectivity to distinguish extremists
trying to destroy a state and those trying to preserve it.
Rezag-Bara asserted that there was no need before or NOW to
establish reconciliation committees as seen in Morocco or
South Africa or in Latin America. These committees had not,
he claimed, established conditions for durable national
reconciliation. Algeria had, he stated, studied individual
countries' cases carefully and had learned enough from them.


2. (U) Minister of Social Solidarity Ould Abbes also spoke
against establishing any kind of national reconciliation
committee, since Bouteflika had drawn up the national
reconciliation program after what he called an intense
dialogue between the government and the Algerian people. He
slammed (unspecified) international NGOs, who opposed the
Algerian government on what he called political grounds, for
pushing the idea in tandem with Algeria's political
opposition. These NGOs and political opponents were
exploiting the families of those who disappeared in police
custody for political ends only. Ould Abbes asserted that
the government had already spent 7 billion dinars (roughly
USD 100 million) compensating families who had filed claims
against the government, and it would spend more. Ould Abbes
defended the government's policy of providing amnesty both to
members of armed groups who had fought the government and to
members of government security forces guilty of human rights
abuses. It would have been impossible to pull Algerian
society out of a long conflict without such a measure, he
concluded.


3. (C) Comment: The vigorous defense of the national
reconciliation program was somewhat peculiar given the
occasion, and we have not seen any public attacks on the
program of late. Certainly Bouteflika views it as his
personal achievement and he too defends it constantly. Some
of our contacts think Bouteflika and his allies are defending
the program against hardliners in the security services who
want to stop giving amnesty to members of armed groups. NGOs
like Freedom House have tried to generate some public support
for a kind of transitional justice and reconciliation
committee process but without making a dent in the
government's stance and without generating much public
pressure either. Instead, many of our contacts say that the
national reconciliation process was fine for the past several
years, but NOW Bouteflika should start figuring out how to
deal with the difficult economic circumstances that ordinary
Algerians face.
FORD