Frenchman's killing in colonial Algeria deemed 'unforgivable' by son
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The son of a French anti-imperialist tortured and killed at the hands of France has said he cannot forgive the matter.
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Maurice Audin; a communist who believed in Algeria's independence (AFP)
The son of a French anti-imperialist tortured and killed by the French army during Algeria's independence war has stated that he cannot forgive and that the "truth" is more important than Paris' apologies.
Maurice Audin, a mathematician and communist who backed Algeria's cause for independence, was assassinated in 1957, three years into an eight-year war that ended French colonial domination. His corpse was never discovered.
In 2018, the French President Emmanuel Macron acknowledged that Audin had "died under torture stemming from the system instigated while Algeria was part of France," asking Audin's widow for forgiveness.
Read more: Macron Underwhelmingly Condemns Paris Massacre of Algerians
However, Audin's son, Pierre, who was in the nation to get an Algerian passport and to witness the presentation of a bust of his father on Sunday, said Macron's apology was "too little, too late."
"What's important is to tell the truth. Not to say, 'I wash my hands of it, I've asked for forgiveness,'" he told AFP.
"There can be no forgiveness -- it was unforgivable."
Pierre was a month and a half old when his father was killed, waiting the majority of his life to have his father's assassination recognized.
"When the president visited my mother (to apologize) I was 61 and already retired... a lifetime had passed," he stated.
Pierre Audin stated that he "only really felt the need" for an Algerian passport following Macron's apologies.
Read more: Macron Questions Existence of Algeria Before French Colonization
He stated that he thinks the paper would assist him in locating his father's remains, which were never retrieved.
"A few days before my mother died, I promised her I would continue looking for the remains," he said.
Since then, Macron has admitted that the French army was responsible for the execution of nationalist lawyer Ali Boumendjel, returned the skulls of 19th-century Algerian resistance members, and opened French official archives on the Algerian war.
However, memories of the colonial past continue to spark diplomatic spats between Paris and Algiers, which is celebrating 60 years of independence on July 5.
