Creation and Purpose
The GPRA was set up in Cairo, Egypt, by the FLN on September 19, 1958, four years into the Algerian War of Independence. Its first President was the moderate nationalist Ferhat Abbas, who had for decades insisted on trying to peacefully reform the French colonial system, before finally despairing and joining the FLN's armed struggle. He was once re-elected to the post, in 1960, but already next year he was sidelined and replaced by Benyoucef Benkhedda, who held the presidency as Algeria was declared independent.
The purpose of the GPRA was to serve as a diplomatic and political tool for the FLN. It allowed sympathizing governments to extend official recognition to it (among those who did, were neighbouring Morocco and Tunisia, as well as Nasserite Egypt and other Arab countries and Pakistan). Its headquarters were located in Tunis, but diplomats were posted in most major world capitals to try to lobby governments and organize local support groups. It was partly intended to serve as a preemptive diplomatic strike against a proposal by French President Charles de Gaulle, to hold a referendum by which Algeria would be given an autonomous status within France.
Read more about this topic: Provisional Government Of The Algerian Republic
Famous quotes containing the words creation and/or purpose:
“We should always remember that the work of art is invariably the creation of a new world, so that the first thing we should do is to study that new world as closely as possible, approaching it as something brand new, having no obvious connection with the worlds we already know. When this new world has been closely studied, then and only then let us examine its links with other worlds, other branches of knowledge.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)
“Language, the machine of the poet, is best fitted for his purpose in its rudest state. Nations, like individuals, first perceive, and then abstract. They advance from particular images to general terms. Hence the vocabulary of an enlightened society is philosophical, that of a half-civilised people is poetical.”
—Thomas Babington Macaulay (1800–1859)