Turkey Criticizes Macron's Comments About Its Alleged Colonialism In Algeria

The remarks of French President Emmanuel Macron describing Turkish rule in Algeria as colonial past is a "cheap" and ineffective approach to get some domestic support ahead of the 2022 French presidential election, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Thursday

ANKARA (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 07th October, 2021) The remarks of French President Emmanuel Macron describing Turkish rule in Algeria as colonial past is a "cheap" and ineffective approach to get some domestic support ahead of the 2022 French presidential election, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Thursday.

"It is extremely wrong to involve Turkey in these discussions since our history does not have such a dark stain as colonialism. We have seen that such cheap approaches are not useful in elections. If he (Macron) has something to say about us, we would prefer him to say it to our face, not behind our back," Cavusoglu told reporters during his visit to Ukraine, broadcast on his Twitter page.

The remark came in response to Macron's citing of the Ottoman rule in Algeria from 1516-1830 before the North African nation was conquered by France, in an effort to cool down ongoing Paris-Algiers tensions.

Over the weekend, Algiers recalled its ambassador to Paris for consultations and banned French military jets from flying in its airspace after France introduced visa curbs in response to what it described as lack of cooperation from three North African states on the migrant issue.

Commenting on the ambassador's recall from Paris, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune accused Macron of twisting the truth about the history of the nation, saying his version was "completely rewritten" by the ruling classes. He described the French president's statements to Le Monde newspaper as irresponsible and insulting to the memory of people who had died during France's colonial rule of Algeria.