KHR’s & AKS Organizations Speech at the UN Forum on Minority Issues

Novembre 27th, 2025

Excellence,

Since 1962, the Algerian government has pursued the assimilation of the Kabyle people through Arabization and Islamic expansion in Kabylia, while closing around 47 churches and restricting Christian worship.

In 2021, an amendment to the Penal Code (Article 87bis) broadened the definition of terrorism to include acts ‘undermining national integrity,’ enabling a climate of repression marked by arbitrary arrests, torture, discrimination, and the denial of cultural and linguistic rights.

The Human Rights rapporteur Mrs. Mary Lawlor (2023) as well as the last Country Periodical Review have pinpointed the severe shortcomings in the juridical system, particularly the said article 87bis.

We want the international community to be aware that as we speak,

1. there are more than 400 kabyle whose only crime is to express their opinion or identity are in jail of whom 38 innocent kabyle condemned to death,

2. Thousands of innocent citizens among whom artists, writers, journalists, are forbidden to travel abroad. Incoming Kabyle Activists are merely taken to jail.

3. The exploitation of zinc mine over an area of 130 km2 in Kabylia that generates an ecocide with dramatic human consequences.

   
   

Therefore our organization requests:

1. The freedom for all prisoners of conscience

2. The suppression of the Article 87bis of the criminal code.

3. The recognition of the Kabyle people and their right to self-determination

4. The immediate cessation of the operation of the Zinc mine