Algeria: The Big Day

"This is a big day," said hefty M'hammed Yazid, the F.L.N. Information Minister, and then he added: "It's my wedding anniversary."

Yazid's mild jest did not obscure the real importance of the occasion. In a single night he had driven 500 miles to Tunis from the Libyan capital of Tripoli, where the Algerian National Revolutionary Council had been in session, to tell waiting newsmen of the cease-fire agreement with France. By an overwhelming vote, the council empowered Premier Benyoussef Benkhedda to conclude the agreement as he saw fit, without the need of obtaining further council approval.

Still, a few irritating details remained to be settled: 1) the F.L.N. is reluctant to give guarantees of safety to some of the more notorious European leaders in the terrorist Secret Army Organization, 2) the F.L.N. wants a firm, detailed timetable on the French agreement to evacuate its army from Algeria within three years, 3) both sides must agree on the Moslem-European membership of the twelve-man Provisional Executive, which will temporarily govern Algeria.

A Casual Stroll. These final hurdles would undoubtedly be overcome this week at yet another meeting of the weary negotiation teams, headed by F.L.N. Vice Premier Belkacem Krim and De Gaulle's Algerian Affairs Minister Louís Joxe. But the daily bloodbath in Algeria mocked the long-delayed promise of peace. The death toll in 1962 has mounted to 1,400. In Algiers, Moslem gunmen shot dead a taxi driver known to be an S.A.O. leader. Within 15 minutes, bands of S.A.O. killers appeared at populous street corners and gunned down 35 Moslem passersby. Three other S.A.O. gunmen last week casually strolled the length of fashionable Rue Michelet shooting all Moslems in their path. While Europeans watched approvingly, twelve Moslems died and nine were wounded. Among the victims: two crippled beggars, one of them 83 years old.

In Oran, S.A.O. men disguised as French soldiers parked two cars with military markings on a crowded boulevard in the Moslem quarter. The cars, loaded with dynamite and 105-mm. shells, exploded in the late afternoon, littering the street with 76 dead and wounded Moslems. Moslems mourned their dead all night long, and the wailing was interrupted only at dawn—by three other heavy charges of plastic bombs in the Moslem quarter.

To Show the World. So far, the F.L.N., has maintained control in the casbahs, preventing any wild outpouring of Moslem mobs. But last week discipline was beginning to slip. Excited by the daytime fasting required by the month-long celebration of Ramadan, infuriated by bombings and indiscriminate killing, the Moslems were beginning to strike back with mass violence of their own. That is precisely the aim of the S.A.O., which hopes to goad the Moslems into a full-scale racial war; in that event the S.A.O. feels confident that the French army will side with the Europeans. The terrorists also hope to show the world that French troops and police no longer control the cities of Algiers and Oran, thus any agreement with the F.L.N. is doomed to failure.