Youne “Medieval prison”. This is how Boualem Sansal describes El Harrach prison, on the eastern outskirts of Algiers, where he was briefly transferred on Wednesday 12 November before flying to Berlin for his first day as a free man. Medieval prisons, penitentiaries that have nothing to envy those in El Salvador or Brazil, Algeria’s Alcatraz, those who live in El Harrach all tell of an inhuman and inhumane universe. Its history begins at the beginning of the 18th centurye Century is no doubt no stranger to this sinister reputation.
Initially, this site was a bordj built in 1724 in a foul-smelling swamp during the Algiers Regency era. A Dey turned these places, where mosquitoes reigned supreme, into enclosures while retaining the Moorish architecture. In 1855, under the government of…
