Sports journalist to spend seven years behind bars for “glorifying terrorism”

Algerian authorities have sentenced a prominent French sports journalist to seven years in prison for “glorifying terrorism”, media rights campaigners RSF have said, denouncing the verdict as “nonsensical”.

Christophe Gleizes, who contributes to the So Foot magazine, will file an appeal on Monday.

Reporters without borders (RSF) has denounced the charges against sports journalist Christophe Gleizes as “baseless”.

Gleizes, 36, was ordered by the court in Tizi Ouzou, northern Algeria, to be immediately incarcerated, RSF said Sunday.

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“He has now been unjustly convicted and imprisoned for simply doing his job,” it said.

France’s AFP news agency reported that Gleizes had been taken to Tizo Ouzou prison straight after his conviction.

After filing his appeal, the case would be heard in October at the earliest.

Gleizes, who has co-authored a book about football in Africa, 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.

He was arrested on 28 May and placed under judicial control and prevented from leaving the country, RSF said.

He was charged with “glorifying terrorism” and “possessing publications for propaganda purposes harmful to national interests.”

● Family and employer “in shock”

RSF says the charges alleging terrorism and propaganda are “baseless” and stem from 2015 and 2017 when Gleizes was in contact with a Tizi Ouzou football figure prominent in the Movement for the Self-Determination of Kabylie (MAK) – designated a “terrorist” organisation by the Algerian authorities in 2021.

“The first two interactions between Christophe Gleizes and this individual occurred well before this designation,” it said, adding he had also not concealed contacting the person again in 2024 as part of preparations for the report.

“Christophe Gleizes has been subjected to an absurd judicial control order for over a year,” said Thibaut Bruttin, RSF’s director general.

“His seven-year sentence is nonsensical and demonstrates one thing: today, nothing escapes politics,” he added.

Gleizes’ employer So Foot, said he’d been “imprisoned for doing his job”.

“His loved ones and editorial team are in shock,” it added.

The jailing of Gleizes comes as a time of growing tension between France and its former colony Algeria.

Algeria arrested and jailed French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal in November on national security charges and has defied calls from President Emmanuel Macron for his release.

Macron angered Algiers in July 2024 when he backed Moroccan sovereignty over the disputed Western Sahara, where Algeria backs the pro-independence Polisario Front. [AFP/rfi.fr]