French press review 19 October 2012

President François Hollande’s condemnation of the bloody repression of Algerians in Paris on 17 October in 1961 that left dozens, probably hundreds dead, attracts comments from a cross section of today’s papers.

Hollande said in a statement issued to mark the anniversary of the killings that "the republic clearly recognises these facts". The statement came as Hollande prepares for an official visit to Algeria in early December. 

Libération commends the president for confessing that  a crime was committed by the state. The paper notes that this is the very first time that France, through the voice of its president, admits that police actually massacred hundreds of Algerians demonstrating for the independence of their country, after 50 years of denial.

Libération regrets that certain voices from the right - whom it accused of being political descendants of officials like Maurice Papon, Michel Debré et Roger Frey, who gave the orders - have dared condemn this gesture of appeasement just like as some did with "courageous" Jacques Chirac’s admission of state responsibility for the arrest of over 13,000 Jewish children on the 16-17 July 1942 for deportation to Nazi concentration camps.

Regional daily La Montagne argues that while the president is implementing a campaign promise, he knows very well that Algeria’s National Liberation Front (NLF) also committed atrocities. The paper regrets that Hollande also forgot to mention when he visited Dakar that blacks were sold by slave-traders but that, according to the paper, is not sufficient reason not to face up to France’s past and heal the wounds.

The admission of “colonial mistakes” is in line with the series of “strong actions” that marked the first six weeks of Hollande’s presidency, according to another regional paper, La Nouvelle République du Centre-Ouest.

Although it was worthwhile to make the admission, recognition is not repentance, says the south-western paper Sud-Ouest.

Another regional newspaper La République du Centre expresses the hope that Hollande should not be too repentant. It recalls the appeal he made in Dakar last week for better relations with Africa.

La République du Centre claims that too much retrospective compassion and self-flagellation may give the impression that France is unable to face its past without resorting to second-rate polemics.

L'Eclair des Pyrénées notes a propensity in Hollande to bring up issues likely to accentuate divisions within the national community.

Le Monde finds that the popularity of Interior minister Manuel Valls could be double-edged.

According to the evening paper, Valls's double-digit approval rating is the prize earned from his tough right-leaning security policies. Le Monde warns that the fact that he has become France’s most popular politician could come back to haunt him.

Le Figaro takes up the mounting anger of doctors as their professinal assocations prepare for a fight to the finish with the government over its plans to set ceilings for medical consultation fees.

The economic newspaper Les Echos reports that Alcatel Lucent has announced plans to shed 1430 jobs in France.

Talking about retrenchment, the Communist Party newspaper L’Humanité publishes a list of pharmaceutical companies sacking workers despite making huge profits.

20 Minutes wonders where China’s women have all gone. The free daily pops the question after a new population survey projected that China’s bachelor population is soon to hit the 40-million mark.

Le Parisien/Aujourd’hui en France bids farewell to Dutch actress Sylvia Kristel who passed away at the age of 60 on Thursday after a long battle with cancer. The paper recalls that Kristel’s iconic Emmanuelle role symbolised the sexual revolution of the 1970s.

The French film was shown in a cinema on the Champs-Elysées in Paris for 13 years and seen by at least 350 million people according to Le Parisien and it regrets that an addiction to cocaine prevented Kristel from living with her fame.