This update covers developments relating to the freedom of expression in Algeria from 7th January 2025 to 1st August 2025.
Against the backdrop of tense diplomatic relations with its neighbors Morocco and Mali, as well as its former ruler France, the space for freedom continued to shrink in Algeria. Political parties are either banned from operating or hindered in their activities, the media is being silenced, and criminal charges are used to crush peaceful dissent. Laws are passed without large consultation and experts fear they could negatively impact activists.
GENERAL
UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders expresses dismay
On 30th January 2025, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, Mary Lawlor, issued a press relase condemning the ongoing restrictions and harassment of human rights defenders in Algeria. Reflecting on her country visit in 2023, she expressed deep disappointment that individuals she met continue to face arbitrary arrests, judicial harassment, intimidation, and criminalisation.
International NGOs call for an end to crackdown
On 7th March 2025, Amnesty International, Article 19, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, Euromed Rights, the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), Human Rights Watch, MENA Rights group, and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) organised a side event during the 58th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, which coincided with the presentation of the Special Rapporteur’s country visit report that took place in 2023. They note that despite this country visit, the government has persisted in suppressing dissent by harshly targeting the rights to free expression, peaceful protest, and association.
In its April 2025 report on Algeria, Amnesty International noted a continued closure of civic space through the use of unfounded terrorism charges imposed on journalists, trade unionists and human rights defenders. According to the international human rights organisation, authorities remained highly intolerant towards peaceful gatherings and prevented human rights and cultural events from taking place. On 24th April 2025, Amnesty denounced a ‘relentless repression’ over the past five months, particularly in response to an online protest movement, reporting 'arbitrary' arrests and ‘unfair’ prosecutions.
UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention looks at detentions of Algerian activists
The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found that Ihsane El Kadi’s arrest and detention in 2022 and 2023 were arbitrary and requested the Government of Algeria to remedy the situation, including compensation, in accordance with international law. Ihsane El Kadi, the founder and director of independent media outlets known for their critical reporting on the Government, has been detained multiple times. The Government did not reply to the communication.
On 4th February 2025, the organisation MENA Rights Group submitted a communication to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention regarding the case of Tahar Larbi. Tahar Larbi was sentenced on 20th November 2024 to four years’ imprisonment. After a series of posts on social media, he had been charged with ‘insulting the President of the Republic’ ‘damaging the image of the security services’ and ‘displaying publications harmful to the national interest’.
Political party cannot hold meeting due to venue cancellations
On 22nd May 2025, the Rally for Culture and Democracy (RCD), an Algerian opposition party, was prevented by the administration of the wilaya of Algiers from holding a political meeting planned on 24th at the Ibn Khaldoun auditorium, a central venue in the capital. The administration justified its refusal by indicating that the hall was not available due to other activities planned for 17 – 30 May. However, the RCD stressed that this was not an isolated case, highlighting a recurring pattern of denial of permission for its political rallies. In response, the party issued a public statement condemning the ban and filed an appeal with the administrative court to challenge the decision.
Law to streamline military mobilisation
On 8th July 2025, the Council of the Nation unanimously adopted two major bills that establishe a new model of security and judicial governance widely regarded by civil society as repressive. One is the General Mobilisation Act, that authorises the armed forces to enter a state of war with presidential approval and mandates the compulsory participation of public institutions, businesses, and citizens. Non-compliance is criminalised, introducing severe penalties for refusal to cooperate. The text entered into force on the 27th July 2025.
Ordinary Algerians and experts raised concerns, fearing military escalation. The Federation of Human Rights and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) expressed their concern regarding the vague wording that grants the executive exceptional powers in terms of requisitioning and controlling property and persons, without sufficient institutional checks and balances. They also deplore that the law was not subject to a broad consultation and a thorough parliamentary debate.
Amendments to criminal procedure code
On 8th July 2025, the Algerian Parliament adopted amendments to the Code of Criminal Procedure. As for the law on general mobilisation, these amendments were passed without transparent consultation with civil society actors.
According to the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, these new provisions weaken guarantees of the right to a fair trial and infringe on freedom of movement. Police custody without judicial authorisation is extended, even after the closure of the investigation by the judicial police, increasing the risk of arbitrary detention without a clear legal basis.
The National Union of Lawyers’ Organisations (UNOA), had called for an emergency meeting with the Minister of Justice to express its reservations on behalf of 60,000 Algerian lawyers regarding provisions it considers to be violations of the rights of defence, such as the strengthening of the powers of the public prosecutor's office and the maintenance of the immediate appearance procedure. They underlined that pre-trial detention should in principle be an exceptional measure and not the rule.
Introduction of the death penalty for drug-related offences
On 1st July 2025, an amendment to the Law No. 04-18 on the prevention and repression of the illicit use and trafficking of narcotics was adopted, introducing increased penalties for repeat offences, including the death penalty for certain offences.
This development runs counter to the global movement toward the abolition of the death penalty and also Algeria’s own commitment as it voted in favour of a moratorium on the death penalty at the UN Human Rights Council in 2024.
ASSOCIATION
Increased repression on Collective of Families of the Disappeared
On 23rd May 2025, the Collective of Families of the Disappeared in Algeria (CFDA) published a press release denouncing an intensification of attacks on its activities. The CFDA, which has been advocating since 1998 for truth and justice regarding enforced disappearances during Algeria's civil conflict in the 1990s, reports a series of coordinated attacks aimed at silencing its work. Two recent events organised in Algiers were banned and physically blocked by the police. Simultaneously, the organisation's digital presence has come under siege: its online radio platform, Radio des Sans Voix, is now inaccessible; the Memorial to the Disappeared website has been destroyed; and the CFDA's main website is blocked within Algeria. The CFDA views these actions as part of a broader effort to erase historical memory and suppress civil society's role in truth-telling and documentation.
EXPRESSION
Imposed silence
According to RSF, since Tebboune’s election in December 2019, the media and journalists have been under constant pressure and the government exerts direct influence on the hiring and firing of executives in the media and in regulatory agencies. As journalists write in the Africa Report, there are virtually no critical reports in circulation any more, and investigative journalistic practices have all but disappeared.
On the occasion of World Press Freedom Day 2025, eleven human rights organisations issued a joint statement condemning the Algerian authorities for ongoing and systemic violations of press freedom. The signatories highlight the misuse of vague and overbroad legal provisions to criminalise dissent and demand the immediate release of all arbitrarily detained individuals and legislative reforms.
French journalist sentenced to seven years in prison for “glorifying terrorism”
On 29th June 2025, French sports journalist Christophe Gleizes was sentenced to seven years in prison for “glorifying terrorism” and for “possessing publications for propaganda purposes harmful to national interests”. The court in Tizi Ouzou, northern Algeria, ordered his immediate incarceration. He was arrested on 28th May 2024 and forced to stay in Algeria for over thirteen months under a judicial control order.
Reporters Without Borders denounces the charges as shockingly unfounded. Gleizes, who is a sport journalist for the magazine So Foot, travelled to Algeria in May 2024 to write about the local Tizi Ouzou football club Jeunesse Sportive de Kabylie (JSK) – named after Algeria’s Kabylie region, home to the Berber Kabyle people. According to the NGO, these accusations are mainly due to the fact that Christophe Gleizes “had been in contact, in 2015 and 2017, with the head of the Tizi Ouzou football club, who is also the leader of the Movement for the Self-Determination of Kabylie (MAK), classified as a terrorist organisation by the Algerian authorities in 2021”.
His seven-year sentence is nonsensical and demonstrates one thing: today, nothing escapes politics, and the Algerian justice system has missed a crucial opportunity to resolve this matter honourably.
- Thibaut Bruttin, RSF Director General
Writer Bouamlem Sansal sentenced to prison for comments made during an interview
On 27th March 2025, 80-year old writer Boualem Sansal was sentenced to five years behind bars on charges related to undermining Algeria’s territorial integrity over comments made to a French media outlet. On 1st July 2025, an Algerian court upheld the five-year prison sentence. He has eight days to file a further appeal before the supreme court.
The Algerian government’s continued imprisonment of Boualem Sansal—an elderly, ill writer who is being punished for his ideas and expression—is both incomprehensible and unconscionable
- Karin Deutsch Karlekar, director of PEN America’s Writers at Risk programme
Historian sentenced for comments on minority during interview
On 3rd June 2025, the Dar El Beida court sentenced Mohamed Amine Belghit, a historian known for making provocative public comments, for the crime of undermining national unity. Belghit, during an interview aired on Sky News Arabia, claimed that the Amazigh identity did not exist and was a "French-Zionist" construct.
The Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement that Belghit had been arrested for: "The crime of undermining national unity by an act targeting national unity with the aim of undermining the symbols of the nation and the republic, the offence of undermining the integrity of national unity, and the offence of disseminating hate speech and discrimination." The public prosecutor had requested a seven-year prison sentence and a heavy fine. He was sentenced to five years in prison and a fine of 500,000 dinars (approximately 3,850 USD).
Human rights defender sentenced to 18 months of effective imprisonment
On 30th April 2025, the Oued Rhiou misdemeanor court in Relizane Province sentenced human rights defender Abdallah Benaoum to 18 months of effective imprisonment. He was also fined 200,000 Algerian dinars and stripped of his civil and political rights for five years. Benaoum was arrested a week before by internal security forces. His home was thoroughly searched, and all phones and electronic devices belonging to him and his family members were confiscated.
The verdict follows charges related to the dissemination of false information likely to undermine public security and order, based on Article 196 bis of the Penal Code, as well as the charge of publishing content deemed harmful to national interest, under Article 96. Benaoum was immediately taken into custody after his trial, under immediate appearance procedure.
Benaoum has been repeatedly arrested since 2018 for criticising the government, both online and via protests. As PEN America writes, he has been arrested in late 2019 and sentenced on multiple charges. After a 154-day hunger strike, Benaoum was released without conditions on 3rd February 2022. He was briefly detained again in October 2023.
Arrest and detention of trade unionist on “terrorism” charges
On 19th March 2025, Ali Mammeri, a civil servant, Hirak activist, and president of the Syndicat national des fonctionnaires de la culture (SNFC) and member of the Conseil national de la Confédération syndicale des Forces Productives (COSYFOP) was arrested at his workplace in Oum El Bouaghi by plainclothes agents.
He was the subject of reprisals and threats of legal action after organising a unionisation campaign in the cultural sector in 2024.
According to the organisation MENA Rights Group, Mammeri’s family and lawyer had not received any official information about his place of detention until 23rd March 2025. On 22nd March 2025, the United Nations Working Group on Enforced Disappearances was informed of Mammeri’s enforced disappearance.
Human rights lawyer sentenced for his posts on social media
On 16th February 2025, Mounir Gharbi, a member of the National Committee for the Liberation of Detainees, was sentenced in absentia by a court in Setif to three years in prison for “publicly displaying publications likely to harm the national interest” and “insulting a constituted authority”. In 2022, he had published comments on Facebook regarding the announcement of the death and arrest of Madani Lslous during an anti-terrorism operation.
Self-immolation attempt by civil society activist
On 1st June 2025, civil society activist Faouzi Abdelkader Zekout attempted to self-immolate in front of the Ministry of Justice to protest against what he described as “ongoing judicial injustice and systematic abuse” by a judge at the Frenda Court (Tiaret Court of Justice). According to news reports, Zakout “is known locally for his volunteer and humanitarian work, regularly participating in community service campaigns and advocating for better local governance”. Faouzi Abdelkader Zekout was previously imprisoned in 2020 due to his civil society activism. He was transferred to the specialised hospital for severe burn victims in Zeralda.
Rise of hate speech against migrants
According to the Cairo Institute for Human Rights, a rise in hate speech against migrants from sub-Saharan Africa can be observed in recent years in Algeria. Migrants face racist rhetoric widely circulated in some media outlets and on social media, amidst large deportation numbers. Between April 2025 and June 2025, Algeria sent back more than 16,000 migrants to Niger.
Arrest and sentencing of poet
On 20th January 2025, an Algiers court sentenced renowned Hirak activist and poet Mohamed Tadjadit to five years in prison under expedited proceedings which undermined his right to a fair trial. He was convicted to five years in prison and a fine for “undermining national unity”, “publishing content harmful to national interest”, “inciting to an unarmed gathering” and “offending public bodies”, based solely on social media publications. Some of the posts relayed the “#Manich_Radi” (“I am not satisfied”) hashtag, which was part of a social media campaign initiated in December 2024 to highlight dissatisfaction with the current government.
According to PEN, Tadjadit had already been arrested multiple times between 2020 and 2024. In July 2024, Amnesty International had asked for the bogus charges to be dropped. He was released by presidential pardon on 1st November 2024 and re-arrested once more on 16th January 2025. His sentence thus came only four days after his arrest.
Detained human rights defender on hunger strike and deprived of visits
Human rights defender and former president of the El Bayadh branch of the now dissolved Algerian League for the Defence of Human Rights Larbi Tahar continues to be detained. On 21st April 2025 he started a hunger strike to protest against his conditions of detention.
According to the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, on 26th May 2025, Larbi Tahar was transferred to the prison of Abadla and he was beaten and harassed by guards, who attempted to force him to end his hunger strike through violence and intimidation. Two days later, his family was informed that he had been punished by being deprived of all his rights, including the right to family visits. This decision contravenes the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners which forbid the prohibition of family contact as a disciplinary or restrictive measure.
Three human rights defenders acquitted after years of prosecution
On 26th February 2025, the Criminal Appeals Court of the Judicial Council of Algiers acquitted human rights defenders Said Boudour, Kaddour Chouicha and Jamila Loukil of “enlisting in a terrorist or subversive organization active abroad or in Algeria.”
Kaddour Chouicha was vice-president of the now dissolved Algerian League for the Defence of Human Rights (LADDH). Jamila Loukil – Chouicha’s wife – and Saïd Boudour, are both journalists and were also members of the LADDH. The case also involved twelve other activists involved in the “Hirak” protest movement.
Website of NGO Riposte Internationale blocked
Since 30th April 2025, internet users, journalists and human rights defenders have reported that it is impossible to access the Riposte Internationale website from Algeria. This event was reported by the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a partnership between the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and the World Organisation Against Torture. Riposte Internationale disseminates information on the human rights situation, governance and citizen mobilisation, including regarding Algeria. The website regularly publishes investigations and reports on the repression of journalists and restrictions on freedom of expression. It is one of the last outlets relaying information on political prisoners, arbitrary arrests, court summonses, convictions and sentences handed down by judges, particularly against human rights defenders.
ASSEMBLY
Critics face travel bans
Human Rights Watch and MENA Rights Group denounced the increased use of arbitrary travel bans to retaliate against perceived critics. These bans can be imposed without due process and formal notice, are often unlimited in duration, and are almost impossible to challenge. They prevent people from leaving the country, separate them from their families and affect them professionally and mentally.
These travel bans are part of a broader campaign of continued harassment of critics of the government, aimed at silencing dissent and eradicating civic space
- Bassam Khawaja, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch and MENA Rights Group documented 23 cases of Algerian nationals subject to travel bans, a pattern that has intensified since 2022 and, among these 23 cases, not a single person was informed of the legal basis for their ban.
Algerian activist detained at airport and removed
On 30th July 2025, Nassera Dutour, president of the Collective of Families of the Disappeared in Algeria (CFDA) and mother of a disappeared person, was detained for three hours by border police at Algiers airport without any justification and then forcibly turned back to France. This removal contravenes the Algerian Constitution and many international treaties guaranteeing that everyone has the right to return to his or her own country.
By violating its own Constitution, the Algerian state has paved the pathway for impunity while breaking the bonds of trust between citizens and the authorities
- The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT)
Arrest and hasty condemnation of trade unionist
On 5th July 2025, trade unionist and secretary general of the National Federation of Railway Workers Lounis Saïdi was arrested, then hastily tried and sentenced to two years in prison and a fine of two million dinars. On 25th June 2025, Saïdi had called for an open-ended strike to protest against deteriorating working conditions and demand wage increases. He denounced the administration's interference in union affairs and the mismanagement of pension and recruitment files, among others.
This conviction came about very quickly, and the day after his call for a strike, the authorities arrested him and pushed for a general assembly to replace him as head of the union and strip him of his union leadership role. The new secretary general immediately called off the strike and issued a statement warning his colleagues against any attempts to cause “disorder”.
This is an unprecedented development of extreme gravity because it involves “the criminalisation and judicialisation of the right to strike and, more generally, of independent union activity, and the subjugation of unions through direct interference by management and other authorities in their internal affairs, with the aim of neutralising them"
- Public statement by the Workers’ Party (PT)
Prevention of teachers’ strike and arrests
On 11th and 12th February 2025, teachers staged a national strike to protest against low salaries and poor working conditions.
Four unions, the National Autonomous Council of Teaching Staff in the Tertiary Education Sector (CNAPESTE), the National Autonomous Union of Secondary and Technical Education Teachers (SNAPEST), the Algerian Organisation of Education Teachers (Madjal), and the Council of Algerian High School Teachers (CELA) called for another two-day strike on 17th and 18th February 2025. On 17th February, the Ministry of Education issued a statement calling the four unions not “representative” and that therefore they did not have the right to call for a strike.
On 24th February 2025, security forces prevented many teachers from entering the city of M’sila, where a rally was organised in front of the Education Department of the wilaya of M’sila. According to the news media Maghreb Emergent, security forces also surrounded the premises of the CNAPESTE National Council, the main union involved in the strike, and arrested the national coordinator of CNAPESTE, Messaoud Boudiba, along with other union members.
On 24th July 2025, the Oran wilaya trade union council of the CNAPESTE (Conseil National Autonome du Personnel Enseignant du Secondaire Ternaire de l’Education) denounced the arbitrary precautionary suspension of several trade unionists, including their wilaya coordinator, Mr A. Rahmane Fitas. These measures were taken following the participation of those concerned in peaceful protests.