The Paris massacre of 1961 occurred on 17 October 1961, during the Algerian War (195462). Under orders from the head of the Parisian police, Maurice Papon, the French National Police attacked a demonstration by 30,000 pro-National Liberation Front (FLN) Algerians. After 37 years of denial and censorship of the press, in 1998 the French government finally acknowledged 40 deaths, while some historians estimate that between 200 and 300 Algerians died. Death was due to heavy-handed beating by the police, as well as mass drownings, as police officers threw demonstrators into the river Seine.

The massacre was intentional, as substantiated by historian Jean-Luc Einaudi, who won a trial against Papon in 1999 (Papon had been convicted in 1998 of crimes against humanity for his role under the Vichy collaborationist regime during World War II). Official documentation and eyewitness accounts within the Paris police department suggest that Papon directed the massacre himself. Police records show that he called for officers in one station to be "subversive" in quelling the demonstrations, and assured them protection from prosecution if they participated.Forty years after the massacre, on 17 October 2001, Bertrand Delano, the Socialist Mayor of Paris, put up a plaque in remembrance of the massacre on the Pont Saint-Michel. How many demonstrators were killed is still unclear. In the absence of official estimates, the plaque commemorating the massacre reads, "In memory of the many Algerians killed during the bloody repression of the peaceful demonstration of 17 October 1961". On 18 February 2007 (the day after Papon's death) calls were made for a Paris Mtro station under construction in Gennevilliers to be named "17 Octobre 1961" in commemoration of the massacre.

Algeria, officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. The country is the largest country by total area in Africa and in the Arab world, and is bordered to the northeast by Tunisia; to the east by Libya; to the southeast by Niger; to the southwest by Mali, Mauritania, and Western Sahara; to the west by Morocco; and to the north by the Mediterranean Sea. It has a semi-arid geography, with most of the population living in the fertile north and the Sahara dominating the geography of the south. Algeria covers an area of 2,381,741 square kilometres (919,595 sq mi), making it the world's tenth largest nation by area, and the largest nation in Africa. With a population of 44 million, Algeria is the ninth-most populous country in Africa, and the 32nd-most populous country in the world. The capital and largest city is Algiers, located in the far north on the Mediterranean coast.

Pre-1962 Algeria has seen many empires and dynasties, including ancient Numidians, Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Romans, Vandals, Byzantines, Umayyads, Abbasids, Rustamids, Idrisids, Aghlabids, Fatimids, Zirids, Hammadids, Almoravids, Almohads, Zayyanids, Spaniards, Ottomans and finally, the French colonial empire. The vast majority of Algeria's population is Arab-Berber, practicing Islam, and using the official languages of Arabic and Berber. However, French serves as an administrative and educational language in some contexts. The main spoken language is Algerian Arabic.

Algeria is a semi-presidential republic, with local constituencies consisting of 58 provinces and 1,541 communes. Algeria is a regional power in North Africa, and a middle power in global affairs. It has the highest Human Development Index of all non-island African countries and one of the largest economies on the continent, based largely on energy exports. Algeria has the world's sixteenth-largest oil reserves and the ninth-largest reserves of natural gas. Sonatrach, the national oil company, is the largest company in Africa, supplying large amounts of natural gas to Europe. Algeria's military is one of the largest in Africa, and has the largest defence budget on the continent. It is a member of the African Union, the Arab League, the OIC, OPEC, the United Nations, and the Arab Maghreb Union, of which it is a founding member.