France is confronting its history in Algeria

IN MARCH, BENEATH the chandeliers of the Elysée palace, four adult cousins met Emmanuel Macron, France’s president. What really happened, they wanted to know, to their grandfather, Ali Boumendjel, a lawyer and nationalist, who died in colonial Algeria after his arrest by French troops in 1957? Officially he committed suicide. In fact, Mr Macron acknowledged, Boumendjel was tortured and killed by the French army. His body was thrown from a window to disguise the cause of death.