Algiers Putsch of 1961 - Trials and Amnesty

Trials and Amnesty

A military court condemned Challe and André Zeller to fifteen years of prison. However, they were granted an amnesty and had their military positions restored five years later. Raoul Salan and Jouhaud escaped. Salan was condemned in absentia to the death penalty (later commuted to life sentence) as was Jouhaud. Salan and others later founded the OAS, a dissident paramilitary organization which attempted to stop the on-going process of the April 1962 Indipendence Evian Agreements for the Algerian territories of France. A July 1968 act granted amnesty 1968 act granted amnesty; the November, 24 1982 law reintegrated the surviving generals into the Army. Raoul Salan, Edmond Jouhaud, and six other generals benefitted from this law.

These repairing Amnesties where seeking to include into the society the conflictual political past and to acknowledge its political value, despite the use of violence. The amnesty or its refusal are thus inseparable from the definition of crimes concerned and always involve a rewriting of history.