Algerians give Chirac a hero's welcome

Jacques Chirac received a hero's welcome yesterday when he became the first French president to make a state visit to Algiers since Algeria's war of independence from France ended in 1962.

The three-day visit is important to Algeria as a symbol of the "end" of the government's brutal decade-old civil war with extremist, Islamist rebels – even though the war is not quite over. It is also important to President Chirac as a statement of France's view that the West is not doomed to a "clash of civilisations" with the Islamic world.

The French President was already well liked in Algeria but his popularity has grown enormously in all Arab countries during his rearguard action against Anglo-American plans to solve the Iraqi crisis with military action.

Hundreds of thousands of people poured into the streets of Algiers yesterday. Others crowded on to balconies, throwing confetti, as M. Chirac and his entourage passed by. He left his car to shake hands with the crowd – something that would have been unthinkable when Algeria was at the height of its civil war eight years ago.

Some people shouted "welcome" in French and Arabic. Others, more practically minded, shouted: "Visas,visas." The possibility of France easing its immigration policy to allow Algerians to visit the 800,000 Algerian citizens living in France – and more than a million other people of Algerian descent – will be one of the issues under discussion during M. Chirac's visit.

In return, the French President is expected to ask the Algerian government to allow similar family visits for the harkis – Algerians who fought on the French side in the war of independence.

As a symbol of reconciliation, M. Chirac visited a cemetery where hundreds of Algerian victims of the civil war are buried. He is also expected to visit a French civilian cemetery. Access to, and upkeep of French graves in Algeria is another contentious point. M. Chirac and the Algerian President, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, signed a declaration pledging friendship between the two peoples, Franco-Algerian summits twice a year and efforts to resolve the travel questions.

Although French presidents, including M. Chirac, have made "working" or "official" visits to Algeria since 1962, this is the first state visit. It is intended as a final, convincing statement that the bitter enmities of the independence war – in which M. Chirac fought as a sub- lieutenant – are forgotten.

Efforts will also be made to rebuild French economic ties with Algeria, many of which were severed when French businesses fled in the face of Islamist terrorist attacks directed against Western residents in the mid-1990s.

More than 100,000 people are estimated to have died in the violence, which began in 1992 when the military halted elections that an Islamist fundamentalist party seemed certain to win. Although the level of violence has subsided in the past two years, more than 500 people are thought to have died last year. Questions are still asked in France on the role of the Algerian military – still the power behind Mr Bouteflika's presidency – in fomenting and even committing some of the "Islamist" outrages.