Download full report with cover - Human Rights Watch

Recommendations

Info

Duihi, contacted on June 1, 2008, said he never heard anything from authorities after submitting his complaints: no one contacted him for additional information or informed him of the results of any investigation. 141 He added that he still had no idea about the contents of the statement he signed in the police station on August 23, 2007. 142 Duihi said also that he had attracted police attention as someone who had urged a boycott of Moroccan legislative elections held on September 7, 2007. He said that in the days before the vote, police were stationed outside his house and, on the afternoon of September 4, police, led by officer Abdelaziz Annouche, conducted a search of his house when his wife and children were there but he was absent. Duihi told us that the police presented no search warrant or other document authorizing the search. They frightened his wife and children, he said, but did not break or take anything. Duihi filed a complaint with the prosecutor’s office in El-Ayoun, requesting that he investigate the September 4 police search of his home, but never heard anything back about this request. The request was dated September 6, 2007 and was stamped as received the same day and given the case number of ق م ا 07/43. Arrests of Human Rights Activist Hamoud Iguilid Hamoud Iguilid, an El-Ayoun resident who is president of the El-Ayoun–Sahara section of the Moroccan Association for Human Rights (Association Marocaine des Droits Humains, AMDH), one of the oldest and best-established national human rights organizations, has been frequently detained arbitrarily but never charged. The focus of police questioning when they have held Iguilid showed that these detentions were prompted by his human rights activism. Iguilid told us that on May 10, 2008 at about 8pm, police intercepted him on an El- Ayoun street, put him in a police wagon and handcuffed and blindfolded him. He said that the police held him in the wagon for 75 minutes, insulted him, and questioned him about the AMDH’s activities and the El-Ayoun–Sahara section’s 141 Human Rights Watch phone interview with Hassan Duihi, June 1, 2008. 142 Email communication from Hassan Duihi to Human Rights Watch, May 4, 2008. Human Rights in Western Sahara and Tindouf 76
involvement in May Day activities alongside union activists. The police searched him and confiscated from him about 700 dirhams (US $98), a written complaint by an alleged victim of human rights abuse, and a USB flash drive containing information related to the AMDH. They then removed the handcuffs and blindfold and released him on a road beyond the city limits. Iguilid filed a complaint with the prosecutor and also sent copies to the ministries of interior and justice. The judicial police in El-Ayoun summoned him and took his oral testimony on May 15 about the incident. Reached by telephone on July 16, 2008, Iguilid said the authorities had not yet contacted him about the results of the investigation or returned to him any of the items the police had confiscated. The police also arrested Iguilid on March 18, 2006, two days before the arrival of King Mohamed VI in El-Ayoun. They held him for several hours and then released him without charge, after the AMDH central bureau protested his detention. However police warned him to remain at home for the next two days and stationed police agents nearby, Iguilid said. 143 In a 2005 incident, police arrested Iguilid at about 3 a.m. on May 27, the morning after the AMDH El-Ayoun-Sahara section had issued a report, under Iguilid’s signature, alleging police abuses in response to the Sahrawi “intifada” that had been raging in El-Ayoun for several days. 144 The police released Iguilid without charge at 7 p.m. that day, he said. In a letter dated July 25, 2005, the Ministry of Justice told Amnesty International that police arrested Iguilid for being drunk in public. 145 Iguilid denied the accusation, explaining, “The Moroccan state has always used drunkenness and drugs as a pretext to arrest human rights and trade union activists.” 146 Shortly before his arrest, Iguilid had given media interviews about human rights abuses committed by the security forces against demonstrators; he continued to do so after his release. 143 Human Rights Watch interview with Hamoud Iguilid, El-Ayoun, November 5, 2007 and email communication from Iguilid to Human Rights Watch, August 9, 2008. 144 “Detailed Report on the Events Occurring in El-Ayoun,” AMDH El-Ayoun-Sahara, May 26, 2005 (in Arabic). 145 Amnesty International, “Morocco / Western Sahara: Sahrawi human rights defenders under attack,” AI Index: MDE 29/008/2005, November 24, 2005, http://asiapacific.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGMDE290082005?open&of=ENG-MAR (accessed November 26, 2008). 146 Email communication from Iguilid, August 9, 2008. 77 Human Rights Watch December 2008
Page 1 and 2:
Morocco/Western Sahara/Algeria Huma
Page 3 and 4:
Copyright © 2008 Human Rights Watc
Page 5 and 6:
2007 Trial of Eight Sahrawi Student
Page 7 and 8:
Map Of North Africa Morocco claims
Page 9 and 10:
improved in the Tindouf camps as we
Page 11 and 12:
Laws Penalizing Attacks on Morocco
Page 13 and 14:
independence demonstrations and in
Page 15 and 16:
ceded de facto administration of th
Page 17 and 18:
Blacks, who constitute a minority w
Page 19 and 20:
initiate disciplinary or judicial m
Page 21 and 22:
• Reinforcing the right to freedo
Page 23 and 24:
Human Rights Watch also urges the A
Page 25 and 26:
A Human Rights Watch team of three
Page 27 and 28:
liberation front to the Geneva Conv
Page 29 and 30:
Background to the Western Sahara Co
Page 31 and 32: Beginning in January 1976, large nu
Page 33 and 34: has obstructed and compromised the
Page 35 and 36: of the organization and its Secreta
Page 37 and 38: Morocco opposes giving MINURSO a hu
Page 39 and 40: The State Department, when presenti
Page 41 and 42: Morocco proposed an autonomy plan,
Page 43 and 44: cooperation in various sectors, und
Page 45 and 46: demonstration by Sahrawis in El-Ayo
Page 47 and 48: Trials held in the court of El-Ayou
Page 49 and 50: In misdemeanor and infraction cases
Page 51 and 52: At trial, the defendants again proc
Page 53 and 54: The judge sentenced as-Sah and al-B
Page 55 and 56: ecause the police were torturing hi
Page 57 and 58: appeared before his interrogators w
Page 59 and 60: checkpost when, according to Asfari
Page 61 and 62: cigarette burns. I told the doctor
Page 63 and 64: Errachdi said later that, at the tr
Page 65 and 66: activities in human rights groups t
Page 67 and 68: Authorities released Haidar in Janu
Page 69 and 70: The secretary general of the Justic
Page 71 and 72: individual policemen are chronic ab
Page 73 and 74: they closed ez-Zai’ar’s complai
Page 75 and 76: The Moroccan government provided Hu
Page 77 and 78: Ngilla el-Hawasi and Zahra Amidane
Page 79 and 80: A woman came to the demonstration a
Page 81: The police took me to an office whe
Page 85 and 86: evening, the officer returned, remo
Page 87 and 88: Second, the response claims that po
Page 89 and 90: Reached by telephone on July 15, 20
Page 91 and 92: I fainted. They untied me and pulle
Page 93 and 94: violence; however, on the basis of
Page 95 and 96: The Sahrawi Association of Victims
Page 97 and 98: Ech-Cherif el-Kouri, of El-Ayoun, b
Page 99 and 100: Governor Drif made clear why author
Page 101 and 102: Hafidha er-Raddad was in her hair s
Page 103 and 104: Freedom of Association for Human Ri
Page 105 and 106: and impede the work of the local br
Page 107 and 108: Republic 191 and distributing them
Page 109 and 110: In June 2005, the month after the A
Page 111 and 112: deterioration in security and to pr
Page 113 and 114: Moroccan Association for Human Righ
Page 115 and 116: Morocco Expels French NGO Human Rig
Page 117 and 118: Morocco Briefly Detains Delegation
Page 119 and 120: Article 87 allows this punishment i
Page 121 and 122: abuses committed by the Polisario a
Page 123 and 124: lood without their consent, detaine
Page 125 and 126: ecord and its close alliance with A
Page 127 and 128: mistreat them. 235 Hathiya Salama M
Page 129 and 130: families across the Moroccan separa
Page 131 and 132: • one took an arduous desert deto
Page 133 and 134:
It is a pretty chaotic situation in
Page 135 and 136:
Human Rights Watch interviewed one
Page 137 and 138:
esidents to move, say, to Algiers m
Page 139 and 140:
accessible in the camps, criticize
Page 141 and 142:
Human Rights Watch did not encounte
Page 143 and 144:
Foreign journalists who visit the c
Page 145 and 146:
We received contradictory informati
Page 147 and 148:
even if the detention is in an esta
Page 149 and 150:
you find any evidence of slavery, b
Page 151 and 152:
was in the hands of the owner. She
Page 153 and 154:
One Sahrawi man showed Human Rights
Page 155 and 156:
Both the Polisario and Saltana’s
Page 157 and 158:
On April 30 2008, a civil court of
Page 159 and 160:
Moroccan authorities and the Morocc
Page 161 and 162:
Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara
Page 163 and 164:
police have been criminally prosecu
Page 165 and 166:
Appendix 2: Response from the Gover
Page 167 and 168:
2. Reconciling Moroccan laws with i
Page 169 and 170:
except to fulfill their duty to pro
Page 171 and 172:
suspension to permanent dismissal (
Page 173 and 174:
ights and freedoms of others.” Fr
Page 175 and 176:
Conclusion and Notes The Moroccan g
Page 177 and 178:
Hotel on Global Human Rights Day, o
Page 179 and 180:
With respect to his arrest, this co
Page 181 and 182:
document, dated June 13, 2007, whic
Page 183 and 184:
and if you could specify the name o
Page 185 and 186:
Appendix 4: SADR’s Response to Hu
Page 187 and 188:
The state has opened its doors to a
Page 189 and 190:
Case 2: Saltana Abdullah, known to
Page 191 and 192:
efforts … to help [Ms. Knana] win
Page 193 and 194:
helped form Khat ech-Chahid in Octo
Page 195 and 196:
We would appreciate learning: the l
Page 197 and 198:
uild Er-Rachid prison under harsh c
Page 199 and 200:
esidents who left the camps in rece
Page 201 and 202:
-Mr. Ahmed Badi Mohamed Salem was b
Page 203 and 204:
health of citizens. Its goal is abo
Page 205 and 206:
Therefore, the blame for this falls
Page 207 and 208:
The conference also took other impo
Page 209 and 210:
To remind you again, the conflict i
Page 211 and 212:
Appendix 7: Letter from Human Right
Page 213 and 214:
Nous serions heureux d’être info
Page 215 and 216:
Joe Stork Directeur exécutif par i
Page 217 and 218:
Translation Sahrawi Democratic Arab
show all

Download full report with cover - Human Rights Watch

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?