In a surprise holiday gesture, the Algerian Consulate-General in Paris announced late on 24 December that holders of both French and Algerian passports could enter Algeria on 25 December without securing the usual visa or laissez-passer.
The exemption, branded a “mesure exceptionnelle,” aimed to ease family reunions and shrink queues at Algiers, Oran and Constantine airports during what airlines predicted would be the busiest Christmas traffic on record. French travel agents said Air Algérie and Transavia flights from Paris-Orly were already 95 % full for 24–25 December.
Ordinarily, dual nationals must travel on a valid Algerian passport or pay €60 for emergency papers—a process that can take two weeks and cause missed flights.
![One-day visa-free window lets Franco-Algerian dual nationals fly home for Christmas]()
Whether or not similar waivers emerge in the future, travellers can avoid last-minute stress by using VisaHQ’s France portal (https://www.visahq.com/france/), which guides French residents through Algerian visa options, processes applications online and delivers timely status updates—helpful for dual nationals and single-passport holders alike.
Mobility managers overseeing energy and telecom-project rotations between France and Algeria seized the opportunity to dispatch engineers for site hand-overs that would otherwise have slipped into January. However, the consulate stressed that the waiver expired at 23:59 on Christmas Day; return legs on 26 December still required proof of dual nationality, and French border police warned that travellers must carry both passports for re-entry checks.
Observers see the pilot scheme as a possible template for future peak periods such as Ramadan and the summer holidays—provided operations ran smoothly and no security incidents were reported.
The exemption, branded a “mesure exceptionnelle,” aimed to ease family reunions and shrink queues at Algiers, Oran and Constantine airports during what airlines predicted would be the busiest Christmas traffic on record. French travel agents said Air Algérie and Transavia flights from Paris-Orly were already 95 % full for 24–25 December.
Ordinarily, dual nationals must travel on a valid Algerian passport or pay €60 for emergency papers—a process that can take two weeks and cause missed flights.
Whether or not similar waivers emerge in the future, travellers can avoid last-minute stress by using VisaHQ’s France portal (https://www.visahq.com/france/), which guides French residents through Algerian visa options, processes applications online and delivers timely status updates—helpful for dual nationals and single-passport holders alike.
Mobility managers overseeing energy and telecom-project rotations between France and Algeria seized the opportunity to dispatch engineers for site hand-overs that would otherwise have slipped into January. However, the consulate stressed that the waiver expired at 23:59 on Christmas Day; return legs on 26 December still required proof of dual nationality, and French border police warned that travellers must carry both passports for re-entry checks.
Observers see the pilot scheme as a possible template for future peak periods such as Ramadan and the summer holidays—provided operations ran smoothly and no security incidents were reported.
