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demonstration by Sahrawis in El-Ayoun protesting the transfer of a Sahrawi inmate
from El-Ayoun prison. That confrontation launched a cycle of pro-independence
demonstrations, sit-ins and clashes with the police that lasted through much of
2005 and that spread from El-Ayoun to other cities in Western Sahara and to Sahrawi
students enrolled at Moroccan universities. In the three years since this period of
sustained protest that is sometimes referred to as the Sahrawi “intifada,” clashes
and public protests have been less frequent.
This report does not examine the extent to which persons in Western Sahara are free
to speak, assemble or associate on issues other than Sahrawi human rights and the
independence option for that region. It does not assess the rights enjoyed, for
example, by trade unionists, or advocates on behalf of the unemployed, or Sahrawis
who advocate in favor of, rather than against, Morocco’s autonomy plan.
Similarly, the section below on trials concerns Sahrawi defendants with proindependence
sentiments. From this sample we are unable to say whether these
trials are more or less fair than the trials of other types of defendants.
The Right to a Fair Trial
Morocco’s justice system fails to provide fair trials to Sahrawis accused of politically
motivated offenses. The courts have regularly convicted persons on the basis of
statements that they repudiated at trial, either on the grounds that the police
tortured them into providing and then signing the statements, or on the ground that
the police fabricated their contents. Many defendants report that the police coerced
them to sign statements that the police prevented them even from reading. The
courts make virtually no effort to investigate these claims by defendants; they also
ignore requests by defendants for prompt medical examinations following the period
of police interrogation to check for signs of abuse.
The evidence of unfair trials is ample partly because, to Morocco’s credit, trials are in
practice generally open to the public. Moroccan and foreign observers have attended
many politically sensitive trials and reported on what they observed.
39 Human Rights Watch December 2008