Algeria has agreed to pardon French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal, who has been detained for a year on charges of “undermining national unity”.

Algeria’s presidency announced plans to free the 81-year-old writer on Wednesday, saying President Abdelmadjid Tebboune had accepted a request from his German counterpart to pardon him on “humanitarian grounds”.

Sansal, a prize-winning author in francophone North African literature, is known for his criticism of Algerian authorities.

He was arrested last November after giving an interview in which he said that France had unjustly transferred Moroccan territory to Algeria during the colonial period from 1830 to 1962 – a claim Algeria views as a challenge to its sovereignty.

In March, Sansal was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment under “a

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