Totem wrote:
Uh-huh, now we can flip them the middle finger anytime they protest
"Now"? What were you doing before?
Oh yeah, renaming fries, I forgot.
The Rwanda stuff is pretty awful. I'm not sure exactly how much the French government was involved, but there's no doubt that it was.
The stuff France did in its ex-African colonies (Chad, Ivory Coast, Central African Republic, Cameroon, Senegal, etc...) is pretty crazy. After the decolonisation, France installed some local dictator that was in pocket of the French governement, usually from the secret services. They made bi-lateral military treaties with most of those countries, so that if ever the government was "threatened" (ie, a revolt to overthrow the dictator, or some civil unrest, etc...) France would intervene militarily. They had permanent military bases in most of those countries. They had commercial treaties for the exclusive access to primary ressources at knock-down prices.
It was neo-colonism, without a doubt. Between the 60s and the 90s (when it more or less stopped), we interveend militarily over 40 times. The latest was in 2001 in Ivory Coast. I was gonna do a phd on that subject, but then I got my current job. It's almost a shame, it would've been cool.
What Bouteflika is saying is a bit weak, though. It's partially true, but then again it's true of all colonialism. Algeria was actually quite well-off for a colony, they were the only one that was actually part of France. Obviously, what the French army did in the war was atrocious and disgusting, and the way we supported Bouteflika from that point on isn't great either. Both of those points would've been much more true, but I guess he's just trying to shore up some populist support.