News

“Forum for Truth & Justice – Sahara Section” is Banned
Almost exactly three years since it was formed in June 2000, the Sahara Section of the Moroccan Forum for Truth and Justice, a human rights NGO whose members have suffered persistent persecution at the hands of the Moroccan government over the last year, was formally dissolved following legal action brought by the Moroccan authorities in the El Ayoun civil court.

The judgement not only dissolves the Sahara Section, but bans its members from meeting or associating with each other. The assets of the Sahara Section are to be liquidated and transferred to the National Bureau of the Forum. An appeal will be lodged, but the offices of the Section have to remain closed until the outcome of the appeal is known.

The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a joint project of the International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH) and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), has launched an urgent appeal to Morocco to cease harrassment of the Sahara Section and conform to the UN General Assembly Declaration of 9th December 1998 regarding human rights defenders.

Early in 2002 the Sahara Section presented the European Union’s ad hoc delegation to Western Sahara with a report accusing the Moroccan state of an attempted genocide against the Saharawi people, giving details of the campaign of terror unleashed after Morocco’s invasion in 1975. The following 15 months have seen members of the Sahara Section sacked from their jobs, followed by the police, and sentenced to long prison terms. Organisations such as the Observatory, and Amnesty International, have condemned the trials for being characterised by harsh sentences and dubious prosecution evidence. Prominent members such as Salek Bazaid, Nassiri Ahmed, El Moussaoui Dkhil and of course Ali Salem Tamek are all currently being held in Moroccan prisons.

Lmrabet - condition critical as attention mounts
(AFP, Le Monde, Euro. Plt. Green Group)
Ramon Gil Casares, Spanish Secretary of State for External Affairs, met the Moroccan Ambassador to Spain on 19th June to appeal for the release of the journalist Ali Lmrabet, sentenced to four years (now reduced to 3 years on appeal) for “insulting the King” and “undermining the territorial integrity of the Kingdom”. The European Commission has indicated that it is “concerned” about the case. Lmrabet, who has been on hunger strike since charged on May 6th, is currently in a critical condition in hospital in Rabat. Meanwhile, the list of human rights organisations appealing for his release seems to grow longer every day - Amnesty International, The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), Reporters Sans Frontieres…

Lmrabet’s hospital bedside has become a busy place recently. On 16th June he was visited by the French MEP Alina Boumedienne-Thiery who, having spent 2 days lobbying Moroccan officials, was allowed to meet him and hear him reaffirm his determination to strike until he is released. He was also visited by Prince Moulay Hicham, maverick first cousin of King Mohamed VI, who appealed to the Moroccan Minister for Justice to meet Lmrabet. A measure of the embarrassment that this is causing the Moroccan government was provided by the arrival of a delegation from the state-sponsored Royal Consultative Commission on Human Rights, which joined the queue at his bedside to deliver an appeal to him to give up his hunger strike “to protect his own right to life”.

Tamek still denied political prisoner rights granted him earlier this year
(As Sabah, Morocco)
Saharawi Prisoner of Conscience and human rights activist Ali Salem Tamek has also been on hunger strike since last Wednesday following his sudden removal from Sale to Ait Melloul prison and consequent loss of political prisoner rights. Saharawi students were forbidden to hold a demonstration in support of him outside the Prisons Directorate.

Corruption: Morocco bottom of the Maghreb in new league table
(L’economiste Morocco)
The Geneva-based World Economic Forum published a league table of corruption in Africa last week, in which Morocco came out as most corrupt country in the Maghreb, pipping Algeria to the title. Tunisia was rated second best out of the 21 countries surveyed – Botswana had the best rating of all Africa, and Nigeria the worst.

Overview: Spinning Against Peace

This weekend has brought a fresh controversy to add to a long list surrounding the relentless barrage of propaganda and disinformation churned out by the official Moroccan press agency, Maghreb Arab Press (MAP). Playing the role of Pravda to Rabat’s Kremlin, over the years MAP has produced a mountain of stories ranging from the merely disingenuous to the malicious, the bizarre and the simply untrue, which can be read both in its own press releases and in the government-tamed sectors of the Moroccan press.

The magazine “Maroc-Hebdo International” (Morocco Weekly International) recently published an article claiming that POLISARIO Front leaders were engaged in selling Saharawi children to a Cuban-based paedophile network. It referred to the respected French NGO Enfants Réfugiés du Monde (Refugee Children of the World) as having condemned this practice.

This is a shocking allegation. Saharawi young people do travel to Cuba, mostly to train as doctors and nurses for the hospitals in the refugee camps. Could it be that this hides a horrific underground trade?

In a word, no. Nor has the NGO referred to by Maroc-Hebdo made any allegation of the kind. Here is an extract from a letter from Nicole Dagnino, Director of “Enfants Réfugiés du Monde”, to the magazine:

“Having worked in the Saharawi refugee camps in the Tindouf region for many years, we are developing, in close collaboration with Saharawi and international partners, aid programmes in the fields of health and education targetting the children and people who live there, in extremely precarious conditions. Aware of the great difficulties they must face, our acts bear witness to many years of solidarity with them.

We were therefore extremely shocked to read the following phrase in an article published by Maroc-Hebdo International, NO 561 of 6th June 2003:

“If we add to that the usage of refugee children in a wide paedophile network in Cuba condemned by organisations such as “Enfants Réfugiés du Monde”, there is little difficulty in calculating the goldmine that the Polisario bosses collect annually”

We hereby make a formal refutation of this affirmation which is not founded on any written or oral declaration emanating from our association. We therefore ask you to make this clear in your next publication.”

It will be interesting to see how prominently the apology is displayed….

This is just the latest and most clumsy piece of spin doctoring. More insidious is the persistently distorted picture of the Saharawis and the situation in Western Sahara presented by government-approved media in Morocco. Repeated assertions (with Sahara Analysis commentary) include

- the refugee camps house no more than 30,000 people (United Nations World Food Programme estimates over 155,000)

- the Saharawi refugees are all cowed “Moroccan hostages” held captive under a reign of terror (for 28 years? in the constant presence of international observers and NGOs?);

- there is no such thing as a Saharawi person, Saharawi culture or Saharawi history – there is only Moroccan (just ask a Saharawi person if this is true!);

- the POLISARIO Front is a group of Moroccan and Mauritanian mercenaries in the pay of Algeria, but that its members who defect to gain comfortable houses and jobs in Morocco are honest and trustworthy witnesses to all the above assertions (no comment….)

Laughable as it may seem, such myth-making is part of a serious Moroccan regime strategy. Journalists who give space to alternative views face imprisonment, like Ali Lmrabet.

With regard to international audiences, the aim is simply to create doubt and confusion, which can be enough to “turn off” people from the Saharawi cause. It is unlikely that the makhzen hope to genuinely convince many. But the principal aim is to stamp out all reasoned and informed discussion of the Western Sahara issue within Morocco, and keep the Moroccan people in a state of fear and suspicion of Saharawis who speak out about their plight. Some Moroccans see through it, but it undoubtedly has an impact.