France, March 27 -- French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal has been sentenced to five years in prison for undermining Algeria's territorial integrity.

Thursday's verdict comes after prosecutors at an Algiers court last week requested a 10-year prison sentence.

The 76-year-old writer, who has been at the centre of a diplomatic crisis between Algeria and France, was arrested in November at Algiers airport after comments made during an interview with a far-right French media outlet.

Sansal told the Frontieres magazine that France had unfairly ceded Moroccan territory to Algeria during the colonial era - a statement that echoed a long-standing Moroccan claim and was seen by Algerian authorities as a challenge to national sovereignty.

Sansa...