France: the Grand Mosque in Paris might be sold to the Algerian State

Algerian authorities have initiated procedures to make the Grand Mosque in Paris a property of the Algerian State, the Minister of Religious Affairs of Algeria, Mohamed Aissa, announced on December 2, 2015.

According to the December 3 issue of Valeurs Actuelles, Mohamed Aissa explained that “the steps taken by the Algerian government” to appropriate the Grand Mosque in Paris rely on “a regulation in French law stating that a foreign country that finances a company incorporated under French law” may, after 15 years, “claim ownership of that institution”. This is the case with the Grand Mosque, which since 2001 has been managed by the Habous Company, a French corporation financed to the tune of 2 million Euros annually by Algeria, and headed by the French-Algerian Dalil Boubakeur.

(Sources: apic/valeursactuelles – DICI no. 327 dated December 18, 2015)