June 1, 1997, Algiers. 4 days before the elections,
a bomb has just exploded. Blocked at the hotel by the authorities, journalists try to
go to the scene of the attack. The police employ all
tricks to save time, so that cleaning teams
can erase the damage. - It is not the moment !
Please go there! - We have the right to work, sir! - Do you have authorization?
- We came with the police. While ultimately we
we manage to pass the roadblocks, to film a bus which has
exploded at Place des Martyrs, a second attack takes place
a few streets away. The ambulances and firefighters leave. - We cannot tell you anything.
Fortunately there were people. - Are there any injuries? Are there any deaths, sir? - Listen please.
I'm a cop, not a citizen. According to the Algerian press, this attack
left 7 dead and dozens injured. Less than 3 quarters of an hour after the bomb, all traces of the attack are erased
by cleaning services. Algiers, 3 million inhabitants,
75% of whom are under 25 years old. This city lives shared
between hope and anguish. Despite the 6000 police officers called
as reinforcement for the elections, the city remains difficult to control. Dominique Molard,
Associated Press journalist, special envoy to Algeria, explains to us
the conditions in which he works. - The rule of the game is that there is a certain
number of things that are not filmed, under penalty of being short-circuited,
censor and possibly expel. If ever there are attacks
or there are somewhat unexpected things, we can't work
hot, there is a delay of 2 hours, time for them to clean up the mess. June 3, 1 bomb has just exploded
at the Casbah market. Karen Lajon, special correspondent for the Journal
on Sunday, she begins her investigation. - There was a girl who spat on me. In Algiers. The most difficult thing is
to obtain precise testimonies. For Algerian journalists, anonymity
is a matter of life and death. Karen managed to evade surveillance
of the police officer responsible for his protection. She returns to the locals
in order to collect information. - If they kick out the hotel taxis every
every time there is a bomb, and then they tell us
that there are no taxis, which take 1 hour to collect taxis
who get lost as if by chance. We arrive here, they are painting
the sidewalks in white when it's over. - He said he was going to have his coffee,
when everything blew up, he was injured on my leg and I asked him to
make the journey again, he didn't want to, and he left, I was given
the names of around ten dead people. This needs to be verified. For our safety, we must never
stay more than half an hour in the same place. - What did she spot?
- 3 terrorists. She said : “These are the guys from the neighborhood, they are
armed, they will kill your journalists." Despite the numerous
patrols in the Casbah, this district remains one of the fundamentalist strongholds. Olivier Quéméner, a cameraman
French, 34 years old, was shot twice in
head on February 1, 94. He was traveling without an escort. June 4, we are going to
Casbah cemetery, where the victims are buried
of the attack the day before. On the day of the funeral,
women are not invited, they will not be able to come until the next day. - Do we know how old the girl was? 5 years ? How is it written? We know why
the 2 men fired 2 bullets? Behind this woman's back?
- What woman ? - The woman who died at the market. - What market? The Algiers press center. This is where all the
Algerian newspapers as a security measure. Karen goes there to get information
on the attack on the Casbah market. The police followed him
to the inside of the newspaper. - They have no right, they
don't have to know who we're interviewing. They must stay outside. You know very well, the orders are
very clear. This is completely normal. Normally you have to wait until
outside, you are not required at all. - You have to work. - Yesterday's attack,
What exactly happened? - We talked about a woman
who refused to plant the bomb. They put 2 bullets to the head and then
they hid the bomb under the corpse. They surrounded the woman like
that, just before the explosion. This means that there are many
deaths, many injured. - Are your conditions special here? - We are caught between two fires. The terrorists who threaten us
daily, always killing us. - And on the power side too? - We are not sanctioned, but there are
has imposed working conditions, which sometimes prevent us from putting
on site information regarding, murder investigations. In Algeria, 68 journalists have
been killed within 2 years. The newspaper La Nation in the heart of Algiers. This daily is banned from publication
for a year by the government. The threat to journalists
is such, that this editor-in-chief, must remain set back from the window,
to describe his neighborhood to us. - On this side, to the end, there
At the bottom, there is the Casino cinema. This is where a bomb
exploded a few days ago inside the cinema, right
afternoon, opposite rue Tangier, 2 Thursdays ago, in the evening,
there were two armed guys, who were cornered by the police,
there was a shooting until 3 a.m. inside the hotel, to my right,
there was a bomb attack, next to the Novelty café which made
a dozen dead right next door, 10 meters away in a building opposite, he is one of the founding members
of the Human Rights League, who was a murderer,
opposite, on the stairs, who go up towards the government palace,
he is a journalist from El Moudjahid, who was murdered and
the list would be long. In this perimeter only, there
has had around fifteen assassinations, or violent acts in
the space of approximately 2 years. Since this interview with
100 meters from the newspaper to the Lux cinema, a new attack left 15 dead. June 5 is election day. We are leaving for Bougara,
40 kilometers from Algiers, accompanied by an escort of 40 men,
the road is very dangerous. This is the famous triangle of
death in the Mitidja plain, one of the fundamentalist strongholds. For the vote, women
are separated from men. Chaber has the courage
to bear witness openly. - We vote to say that we exist, to
show that we don't want this violence, we don't want this insecurity. We are here, we are present for our country. To show that there is no
that the people who plant the bombs, It's not just people who do bad things, there are always people who want
whether their country is a developed country, a classy country. We want to be like the foreigner,
we want to be like, for example, France. We suffer. I want to go out,
I want to take a walk. Where is the security? There are not any. We're still locked in the house,
we do nothing, we are afraid to move, we are afraid to do anything. There are people who
walk the streets, they are still waiting
something behind. It's all bad, it's true,
especially in Bougara, especially in this town. It's a very hot city,
because it is very close to Mitidja, it's very close to the mountains,
they can hide, we take the example of Oran,
it's not the same thing as Bougara. Oran is a city where,
has no mountains around, There is a little more security,
they can't find where they are hiding. Oran, nicknamed the Switzerland of Algeria,
close to Spain, open to Europe, this city of 850,000 inhabitants
is the rail capital. She saw the birth of the singer Khaled,
the playwright Abdelkader Alloula, and singer Cheb Hasni
were murdered there. This city, despite everything, is spared by
the wave of violence plaguing the country. Oran refuses the law of assassins. - Here, it's mixed. You can find women with
hijab, women in swimsuits. There are women who are attached to
Islam and they don't like beaches, and that is not tolerated in Islam. Around the 70s and 80s, there was
more women on the beaches. - What happened ?
- I don't know. People have more religious tendencies,
and are becoming more and more attached to Islam, because maybe they see some hope, people who have problems, their only
The remedy is generally religion. Abdelkader, 26 years old, Muslim
practitioner, and his friend Mohamed. Both are firefighters. They invite us to visit
their barracks in the center of Oran. The Quran tolerates the interruption of prayer
when it comes to a case of life or death. At the Oran Cultural Center,
a woman has just been attacked. - What is the problem ?
- She was hit by her husband, she has a broken tooth and she presents
a sore at the gum level. - This often happens
types of interventions? - We can say that it is a bit common.
- How do you explain that here? - I don't know, I think
it's people's mentalities, men who are a little bit strict. - What recourse does he have?
for a woman who was beaten? Can she file a complaint?
- Yes, she can file a complaint. But 90% of the time I could say
that the woman will never file a complaint. - There is someone who is
beating his wife! You don't intervene? - It's up to the police to intervene. - Still, he hurt her,
he slapped him at least 10 times. - She's the one who did the harm. Maybe that's who did it
harm this guy. She may have touched his dignity. Firefighter Abdelkader, like
every Friday after prayer, visits his friend Mohamed
for the traditional lunch. - People who are doing
what we call massacres, it is not the whole of Algeria,
it's a small part of Algeria, Education plays a very big role.
We were raised in traditions, that is to say praying,
respect others. So we think that way. Now with the parable
and many things, people are pretty focused
on the outside, on the foreigner. For several years, information has been passing
by the parables that invaded the land, overriding all forms of censorship.
They are banned in Iran, they flourish in Algeria. - Me, I'm in my thirties a little
little, so it can't influence me. On the other hand, if we go to see with
a young girl aged 16-18, it will influence him. In a country where you can travel,
work, go to the beach and dance, are acts of courage, young people
Oranese refuse violence. In this bar, the cocktail
the fashion is called Resistance. Salima is a student in
languages at the University of Oran. - Here in Oran, things are rather calm. That is to say, we must not move away
and we live life as we should. - We can go out, we can take a walk.
We can go wherever we want, it's calm. - Algiers is different. Alger
don't allow what we allow ourselves, There is a big difference. There, we
can't afford to go out on the town as we go out here. Girls in Algeria, they hope to pass
their higher education away from home to spend a few
moments of student life and free life. At home, they don't allow themselves this
that they can afford to go to university. - Girls, they go out, they sleep, - How do they do it?
- Afternoons. Instead of doing this at night,
they do it in the afternoons. - There's a lot of hypocrisy, then?
- We are hypocrites in all this. It's because of our parents. Our society is unforgivable. If we do something stupid with a friend,
This is unforgivable from our parents. - There are parents who are cool,
who understand the situation now. - If you lose your virginity with your boyfriend,
you're not going to tell me that your parents, They will forgive you. It's serious ! - No, but there are
who still forgives. - No, I don't agree with you. Our society is unforgivable. - My parents tolerate a lot of things
compared to other parents. But that's not why
I do what I want, I take responsibility for everything I do. - Oran, at home, It's okay, not great, but it's okay
much better than Algiers, than elsewhere. Oran, in our country, there
still have peace. It's a free zone, not 100%,
but the things that happen elsewhere, we are fed up. Firefighters are the barometer of their
interventions, reflect the state of the city, their emotions, the state of its inhabitants. Oran lives to the rhythm of children
problems of a completely normal city. Unlike Algiers, the firefighters of Oran
did not intervene in an attack since the beginning of the events. - These are classic small fires. - Despite difficulties
that there is in Algeria, we are all brothers.
We will try to always be. June 15. This war caused 1,786
victims since the beginning of the year, and 150 deaths since the end of this report.
