The Joint Committee of former “Islamist Detainees” in co-ordination with “Al-Haqiqa: for Defending Prisoners of Conscience and Belief” announces that the protest planned for October 23rd had been subjected to barbaric methods of suppression and intimidation by the Moroccan Government. This protest was organised under the banner of ‘Together for the Sake of Ending Oppression and Ending the Sexual Abuse Taking Place in Moroccan Prisons.’

During the repression by the Moroccan authorities, protesters were subjected to severe brutality to the extent that severe injuries were reported including broken bones and the victimisation of children. The slew of injuries occurred when protesters were stamped on, hit by sticks, chased along the streets, arrested and detained for long hours. Human rights activist, Mohammed Haqiqi, director of Al Karama, was also targeted in a savage assault by the security forces as they stamped on him, tore off his clothes and arrested him as well.

We would like to say that in the case of the Islamist detainees, they have endured horrendous forms of abuse and are still undergoing this inhumane treatment.  The abuse varies from kidnapping, torture (physical and mental), electrocution, rape and other forms of sexual abuse, stress positions, and mock trials.  This category of prisoners is not given even their basic legal rights and forced to take part in biased and unfair trials with no access to legal representation. 

In addition, they are confined under unsanitary conditions with no concern for their fundamental human rights or physical or psychological well-being while in the care of the Moroccan government and their employees; the prisoners undergo immense torture. These prisoners, often imprisoned only due to their religious observance, are denied religious rights, denied access to the Qur’an, have their beliefs mocked and scorned, and to add insult to injury, the guards and administration abuse the Qur’an as well as prisoners, punishing and degrading those who dare to recite Qur’an audibly, pray or perform other acts of faith.

Prisoners are sexually abused with sticks, have their nails removed forcibly and are forced to strip and act like animals, e.g. prisoners are told to bark like dogs. Additional forms of abuse include suspending prisoners upside down by their feet until loss of consciousness and prohibition of any restive time (as evidenced in “Sale” Prison No.2) and any opportunity to study. These methods only number a few amongst the many methods employed by the prison administration.

In addition to the preceding and in detriment to their health and personal hygiene, prisoners are not allowed to take baths and are fed food infested with worms and insects, causing various diseases and illnesses: conditions only exacerbated by the routine denial of any access to medicine and medical care. All of which is deliberately inflicted in order to humiliate and torture prisoners both physically as well as mentally. The abusive treatment is conducted in a highly demeaning and belittling manner, punctuated by the arrogance of guards who relentlessly seek to instill emotions of helpless and hopelessness thereby causing great stress to the prisoners.

This is the reality of the Moroccan prisons.  These are not stories or myths. These are the realities of what is taking place in a country that claims to be just and claims to give their citizens rights while supposedly promoting equality. Behind closed doors, however, a stark and disturbing picture of suppression and torture emerges.

This torture and inhumane treatment is taking place in Morocco against Moroccan prisoners despite state-run media attempts to persuade the Moroccan public that the regime of “coal and bullets” no longer remains and that a new government and monarchy is in power, ending the past ideology of “coal and bullets.” This absurd claim is far from the truth as the current government has opened up a new chapter of horrors in dealing with the Moroccan public through the use of uranium as well as bullets and torture.

Part of the Moroccan public who have are now victims of this new era, erroneously mislabeled as ‘peaceful’ by the media, face many difficulties in their everyday life due to the current ‘harmonious’ regime. The pervasive public sentiment is that there is an institutionalisation of this policy of repression and torture while the government repeats the mantra that it is ‘virtually dismantling these terrorsit cells’ as a justification of its actions against its citizens.

These are only false propagations and lies utilised by the government to deflect attention on the cases of systematic detainee abuse and human rights violations when exposed to the public. The government shamelessly tries to veil its hostility to the people and justify abuse under the pretext of combating terrorism. Examples of such false cases are revealed in the proceedings concerning the 16th and 17th of May in which the purported instances of terrorism were actually found to have been fabricated in order to facilitate the arrest of individuals under accusations of terrorism without fair trial or even evidence.

The Islamic detainees gained support from the public through video clips and protests in prisons that documented the reality of the conditions within the prisons as opposed to the propaganda broadcasted by state media. The public was convinced by the concrete proofs presented that these individuals were innocent and had been victimised for the benefit of the Moroccan government to cover up its mistakes and failures in dealing with security issues. They also came to realise that these individuals were a political offering by the Moroccan government to appease its allies in the War on Islam and thereby once again parade to the public a sampling of the so-called ‘terrorists’ and ‘radical Islamists.’

Finally, the meeting on the 25th March, which involved the authorities admitting to the innocence of these individuals and that they had been oppressed and treated unfairly, led to an agreement that the prisoners would be released, given due process, and restore their full rights under the established law. This agreement was unsatisfactory to some parties within the government, such as the ‘bodies of genocide,’ as they benefited from the continued false imprisonment of these people.

The incidents which took place on the 16th and 17th May were used by the Commissary to escalate its hostile policy, using these ‘bombings’ as an excuse to circumvent the agreement previously made on the 25th March 2011.  They again tried to convince the public that terrorism still existed and that these prisoners should not be released and also used these incidents to justify the torture that prisoners were subjected to in the Moroccan prisons.  Still worse was the Commissary’s use of favors and punishments in order to weave discord in the prison system by pitting what it termed ‘good’ prisoners against ‘troublemakers.’

The truth is that all the prisoners within the Moroccan prisons are innocent and have been detained unjustly with no proof of any crimes being committed. Therefore, we announce that we are planning to go ahead with our journey of struggle through all the peaceful means despite the restrictions and suppression that we face.  We are also fighting against the confiscation of our rights to peaceful protest to expose the abuse and excessive oppression that the prisoners are facing in Morocco.  We demand an end to this series of kidnappings and mock trials and in doing so, we hope to fulfill the agreement made by the authorities on the 25th March for the release of the individuals who have been detained unjustly.

{Those who do wrong will come to know by what a (great) reverse they will be overturned!}
[26: 227]

Peace be upon you,
A Voice For The Political Detainees In Morocco