Word: evian
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Alarmed by the growing wave of nationalization of French-owned property, the government of Charles de Gaulle last week demanded a new round of diplomatic talks with Algeria. France's complaint: Premier Ahmed ben Bella's headlong plunge into socialism is in serious violation of the 1962 Evian ac cords, which granted Algeria independence. At a National Assembly budget hearing, Finance Minister Valery Giscard d'Estaing hinted that French aid to Algeria might be slashed by amounts equal to "compensation that would be due French citizens for nationalizations or spoliations...
...into its former colony. While French aid is to be drastically reduced after Jan. 1, France will continue to be Algeria's biggest market and capital source. Thus, what chiefly worries Western diplomats in Algiers is Ben Bella's contemptuous disregard for the Evian agreements that set the terms for France's withdrawal from Algeria. The Premier, who was still a prisoner of the French when the accord was drawn up, says vaguely that it needs to be revised, but simply ignores any of its provisions that seem inconvenient. Such gestures as his seizure of Algiers...
...concerned by the regime's callous, wholesale violation of its pledge to take no reprisals against the harkis, as Algerians call the 100,000 Moslem auxiliaries who fought against the F.L.N. in the French army. "Without this guarantee," says an angry French diplomat, "there would have been no Evian agreements." Only 5,000 harkis emigrated to France after independence. But of those who remained, many thousands have been shipped off to forced labor camps. Some were put to work clearing minefields-by being forced to walk across them. Many others have been tortured, mutilated and thrown into jail along...
Courageous Stand. On the subject of Algeria's relations with France, and on the rights of Europeans in Algeria guaranteed under the Evian Agreement, Ben Bella sounded eminently reasonable. In several meetings, he urged France's Foreign Minister Maurice Couve de Murville to help persuade French industrialists and technicians to aid in reopening Algeria's closed factories, and to see that French doctors and teachers returned to their posts. Though an avowed socialist, Ben Bella insisted that Algeria would have "a mixed economy including both state and private industry." In an hour-long chat with Russia...
Garrison Joys. Though he had temporarily disposed of one opponent, Ben Bella had plenty left. The rugged Berber guerrillas of Wilaya 3 were still holding out in the impregnable mountains of Kabylia. led by hard-bitten Belkacem Krim. who negotiated the Evian agreements with France and may still have the power to oust Ben Bella. Also ranged against Ben Bella is the bulk of organized labor in Algeria, led by realistic unionists such as Ali Yahia, an ex-schoolteacher who believes that living standards can be maintained only through cooperation with France. Even more bitterly opposed to the Politburo...