Torture During The Algerian War - 2000s Controversies - Bigeard's Attitude

Bigeard's Attitude

General Marcel Bigeard, who had denied employing torture for forty years, finally also admitted that it had been used, although he claimed that he personally had not engaged in the practice. Bigeard, who qualified FLN activists as "savages", claimed torture was a "necessary evil." To the contrary, General Jacques Massu denounced it, following Aussaresses' revelations, and before his death pronounced himself in favor of an official condemnation of the use of torture during the war.

Bigeard's justification of torture has been criticized by various persons, among whom Joseph Doré, archbishop of Strasbourg, and Marc Lienhard, president of the Lutheran Church of the Augsburg confession of Alsace and Lorraine.

In June 2000, Bigeard declared that he was based in Sidi Ferruch, known as a torture center and from which many Algerians never left alive. Bigeard qualified Louisette Ighilahriz's revelations, published in Le Monde on 20 June 2000, as "lies". An ALN activist, Louisette Ighilahriz, had been tortured by General Massu. She herself called Bigeard a "liar", and criticized him for continuing to deny the use of torture 40 years later. However, since General Massu's revelations, Bigeard has now admitted the use of torture, although he denies having personally used it. He then declared: "You are striking the heart of an 84-year-old man." Bigeard also recognized that Larbi Ben M’Hidi had been assassinated, and his death disguised as a "suicide".