International Journal on Criminology Volume 6, Number 1, Spring 2018 | Page 59

International Journal on Criminology
wrongs—communications director for the Bordeaux town hall from 1995 to 2000
and for the French Association of Mayors from 2000 to 2002—specified that his
decision was taken following a “social media” campaign, describing the participants
of the academic symposium at the Caen Memorial museum (university academics,
journalists, Parti Socialiste (PS, Socialist Party), Republican and Union
des Démocrates et Indépendants (UDI, Union of Democrats and Independents)
members of parliament) as nearly if not entirely far-right! Rescheduled for a few
days later at the Sorbonne, this symposium was cancelled for a second time under
similar circumstances.
A RESPONSE FROM ALAIN CHOUET
Alain Chouet, a well-known Islamic studies expert, specialist on Syria, and
former head of the Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE,
Directorate-General for External Security) intelligence services, forwarded
this statement to a number of editors:
“The Syria Symposium—The Challenges of Syria and the Region—that
was due to take place this November 26 at the Caen Memorial museum and to
which I had been invited to speak has just been cancelled upon the decision of the
Memorial museum director who, after agreeing for the symposium to be held a
few months ago, has just withdrawn his agreement at the last moment.
The Memorial director claims to have taken the decision to oppose the
event after being alerted “by social media” (providing no further details) that this
symposium would bring together “well-known far-right activists sympathetic to
Bashar al-Assad ...” It would have been intellectually decent on his part, however,
to verify such assertions before taking his decision.
I do not know all of the participants of the symposium but those I do know
are neither on the far-right nor sympathetic to Bashar al-Assad, notably: Michel
Raimbaud, former ambassador and former director of the French Office for the
Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons; René Naba, former AFP correspondent
in Beirut, and consultant to the International Institute for Peace, Justice and
Human Rights (IIPJHR) based in Geneva; Richard Labévière, journalist and writer,
and former member of the Socialist Party; Joël Bruneau, UMP-UDI-MoDem
(Union pour un Mouvement Populaire-Union des Démocrates et Indépendants-
Mouvement Démocrate) mayor of Caen; Gérard Bapt, PS member of the National
Assembly; Adonis (the pen name for philosopher and Syrian-Lebanese poet Ali
Ahmad Said Esber); Jean Marie Schléret, UMP member of the National Assembly,
and former chairman of the National Advisory Council for Disabled Persons;
Majed Nehmé, director of the journal Afrique Asie (created by Simon Malley, this
journal won fame combating Arab and African dictatorships and the anti-apartheid
struggle); and finally, myself, removed from my post in summer 2002 due to
suspected membership of the PS and “Jospinism.”
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