Paris says Algeria broke the 2013 agreement. Algiers replies that it was Paris that suspended it — without telling Algeria

Camille Berthier — Paris, France — 2026-09-24

Paris says Algeria broke it. Algiers replies that it was Paris that suspended the agreement — and did not even inform Algeria. The text itself is formal: article 8 requires notification through diplomatic channels. The French chargé d'affaires, summoned four times, replied four times that he had received no instructions.

We must begin with the rule, because everything else follows from it. The Algerian-French agreement of 2013 organises visa exemption for holders of diplomatic and service passports. It contains an article 8: to suspend it, it must be notified — officially, through diplomatic channels. That is the only valid route between two states.

It is precisely that route that was not used.

In a statement from the Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the National Community Abroad and African Affairs, reported by the daily Alger 16, Algiers notes that to this day, and “in flagrant violation of article 8 of this agreement”, it has received no official notification through diplomatic channels.

Worse: the chargé d'affaires of the French embassy in Algiers, summoned on four occasions to the Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “systematically asserted that he had no instruction from his ministry of reference”. And he was unable to respond to the requests for clarification from the Algerian authorities.

Four summonses. Four times without an answer.

The method, as Algiers describes it

The statement does not stop at the substance. It also describes the form, and that is where it hits the mark. Algiers denounces a “curious and dubious” practice consisting of “orchestrating crude leaks to certain media carefully chosen by the services of the French Ministry of the Interior and the Directorate-General of the National Police”.

In other words, according to Algiers: the decision was announced in the press before being notified to the state concerned. A mode of communication which, the ministry writes, “violates established diplomatic practice” and “manifestly breaks with the provisions of the 2013 agreement”.

There is a simple reason for this way of doing things, and it is not an honourable one: a leak carries no signature. It allows the rupture to be pinned on the other side, while keeping one's hands free.

What Algiers says, and what overturns the French version

Here is the point the French press did not take up, and it is decisive.

Paris suggests that Algeria was the first to fail in its commitments. Algiers calls that an “inaccuracy” and a “falsehood”, and recalls the history — a verifiable history, made of dates:

1986. When the visa was introduced between the two countries, it was France that proposed an exemption for diplomatic passports. Algeria refused, “clearly and unequivocally”.
The 1990s. That refusal was maintained in the face of three similar French proposals.
2007. After a new French initiative, Algiers agreed to a first agreement, of limited scope.
2013. A new agreement, again on a French initiative, extended the exemption to service passports, replacing the 2007 one.

Four French requests. One Algerian refusal, then three more refusals, then two agreements consented to. That is the chronology. It is not ours: it is in the statement, and it is dated.

Algiers' conclusion has a coldness worth all the editorials: “today as yesterday, Algeria attaches no particular interest to this agreement”. It “takes note of what amounts to a de facto suspension of the 2013 agreement, outside formal procedures, and will draw all the consequences from it”.

Translation: it is Paris that suspended. Algiers is merely taking note.

And the response will be proportionate, the statement announces: a “rigorous application of reciprocity”, “commensurate with the French party's failure to meet its obligations”.

The agreements France is said to have violated

The Algerian ministry does not stop at 2013. It draws up a list, and every line is a treaty:

the 1968 agreement on freedom of movement and work;
the 1974 consular agreement;
the 2013 agreement on visa exemption for diplomatic passports;
the 1994 agreement on the expulsion of Algerians from France, which Algiers accuses Paris of having “distorted”;
and the European Convention on Human Rights of 1950.

Five texts. One country reproaching another for not honouring its commitments, while violating five of them — including a human rights convention.

And meanwhile, the airlines

One scene remains, smaller, but it says everything.

Algerians are turned away at boarding for Morocco by Air France and Transavia. One Algerian woman was refused at Orly by Transavia. The detail the Algerian press picked up on, and which does not hold together: the services concerned were not informed of the measure on the eve of its entry into force.

An airline does not refuse a passenger on an international flight without a written instruction. And a written instruction has an author. Neither the Moroccan authorities nor the French carriers have owned up to the measure.

And the precedent is there, in the archives: in 1994, after the Marrakesh attack — an attack with no link to Algeria or Algerians — Rabat had imposed a visa on Algerians and on French nationals of Algerian origin. At least at that time, the decision was owned and announced before it came into force.

Thirty-two years later, it is still not owned. It is allowed to seep out.

The five contradictions

First. Paris reproaches Algiers with a rupture that Algiers has not pronounced — and which Algiers says is a French de facto suspension, with no notification.

Second. Paris demands respect for the agreements, and Algiers counters with five violated texts, including the European Convention on Human Rights.

Third. Paris announces its decisions through leaks to selected media — a violation of diplomatic practice — then reproaches the other side for not negotiating.

Fourth. The French chargé d'affaires, summoned four times, never had any instruction. A state cannot be required to deal with a representative who knows nothing.

Who asked for the diplomatic passport exemption? France, in 1986. Who refused it? Algeria. Who came back to the charge three times in the 1990s, then in 2007, then in 2013? France.

Fifth. Algerians are refused at boarding — and no one knows who decided it.

Sources: Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the National Community Abroad and African Affairs — statement on the 2013 agreement, reported by Alger 16 (September 2026 edition) · TSA Algérie, 23/09/2026 — “Diplomatic visas: Algeria accuses France of bad faith” · TSA Algérie, 23/09/2026 — Algerians barred from entering Morocco: the strange attitude of Air France and Transavia · Le Jeune Indépendant — Following the French president's letter: Algiers ends the 2013 agreement on diplomatic passports · Alger 16 — The chargé d'affaires of the French embassy in Algiers summoned to the MFA headquarters.