{"id":33962,"date":"2017-04-17T09:50:59","date_gmt":"2017-04-17T09:50:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/france-gives-citizenship-to-28-african-ww2\/"},"modified":"2017-04-17T09:50:54","modified_gmt":"2017-04-17T09:50:54","slug":"france-gives-citizenship-to-28-african-ww2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/france-gives-citizenship-to-28-african-ww2\/","title":{"rendered":"France gives citizenship to 28 African WW2 veterans"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>{French President Francois Hollande has given citizenship to 28 Africans who fought for France in World War Two and other conflicts.}<\/p>\n<p>Mr Hollande said France owed them &#8220;a debt of blood&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>The veterans &#8211; many from Senegal, and aged between 78 and 90 &#8211; received their new certificates of citizenship at the Elysee Palace in Paris.<\/p>\n<p>Campaigners have long been calling for the rights of the veterans, long-term French residents, to be recognised.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;France is proud to welcome you, just as you were proud to carry its flag, the flag of freedom,&#8221; said President Hollande.<\/p>\n<p>More naturalisation ceremonies are expected to follow for other veterans in France.<br \/>\nOne of those granted citizenship on Saturday, Mohamed Toure, said the gesture will go some way towards healing old wounds.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;President Hollande did what none of his predecessors ever imagined. And that repairs a lot of things,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>The granddaughter of a Senegalese soldier, Aissatou Seck, who is herself deputy mayor of a Parisian suburb, has been a lead campaigner for African veterans&#8217; rights.<\/p>\n<p>Last year, she started a petition that gained tens of thousands of signatures in less than a week.<\/p>\n<p>The veterans have long been struggling for recognition and equality in France.<\/p>\n<p>Until 2010, they received lower pensions than their French counterparts.<\/p>\n<p>Their ambiguous status also meant they lacked access to other benefits and sometimes found it difficult to travel, said the BBC&#8217;s Africa editor, Mary Harper.<\/p>\n<p>In 1944, dozens of West Africans were shot dead by French troops when they mutinied over unequal pay and pensions.<\/p>\n<p>A few years ago, Mr Hollande acknowledged that French soldiers had gunned down their African counterparts.<\/p>\n<p>But many war veterans are still demanding a full apology.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"spip-document spip-document-19411 aligncenter\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/jpg\/_95654467_f2196f20-7258-4cfc-b90f-1ec24027683b.jpg\" alt=\"French President Francois Hollande (centre right) shakes the hand of one of the veterans\" \/><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"spip-document spip-document-19410 aligncenter\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/jpg\/_95654465_689b3fa5-f365-4b26-a4fe-7025e1b3b61e.jpg\" alt=\"Many of the veterans wore medals pinned to their suits\" \/><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"spip-document spip-document-19409 aligncenter\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/jpg\/_95653653_3e1827a1-40d6-4be2-b91b-d47d6c4d99b1.jpg\" alt=\"Many of the veterans fought with the French army in Algeria and Asia\" \/><\/figure>\n<p>Source:BBC <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>{French President Francois Hollande has given citizenship to 28 Africans who fought for France in World War Two and other conflicts.} Mr Hollande said France owed them &#8220;a debt of blood&#8221;. The veterans &#8211; many from Senegal, and aged between 78 and 90 &#8211; received their new certificates of citizenship at the Elysee Palace in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[100],"byline":[160],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-33962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-africa","byline-theophile-niyitegeka"],"bylines":[{"id":160,"name":"Th\u00e9ophile Niyitegeka","slug":"theophile-niyitegeka","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":3}],"contributors":[{"id":160,"name":"Th\u00e9ophile Niyitegeka","slug":"theophile-niyitegeka","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":3}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33962"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33962\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33962"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=33962"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=33962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}