In the new year of 1961, as soon as memories of the bitter December days in Algiers had begun to fade, the complex spider's web of pre-negotiations was spinning again. The ever-ready, helpful and hopeful Bourguiba was at Rambouillet in February, and a Swiss journalist close to the G.P.R.A. brought encouraging noises from Tunis. In great secrecy de Gaulle despatched his trusted banker friend, Georges Pompidou (whom he had called upon to help draw up his first cabinet back in 1958) to the quiet and bürgerlich Swiss cuckoo-clock city of Lucerne. It was not quite Pompidou's scene, nevertheless it provided an inconspicuous backdrop against which he could meet the jovial Algerian lawyer, Ahmed Boumendjel, who had led the unsuccessful talks at Melun the previous year. The two men got on well enough together, and the mere fact of Pompidou's presence was accepted by the main body of the G.P.R.A. as a measure of de Gaulle's seriousness.

XREF: Connects to the broader narrative of the Algerian independence negotiations and de Gaulle's diplomatic maneuvering detailed elsewhere in this work.

Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Alge…, loc. 1420