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Morocco’s King Mohamed VI pardons imprisoned journalists, activists
9:32 CAT | 30 Jul 2024
FILE - The mother of Omar Radi, a prominent Moroccan journalist and activist on trial over charges of rape and receiving foreign funds in Casablanca on September 22, 2020. [File photo: Fadel Senna/AF]
Morocco’s King Mohammed VI pardoned three journalists, as well as an activist and a historian on Monday to mark his 25th anniversary as monarch. Rights groups criticised the journalists’ detentions as repressive tactics to silence critics. In total, 2,476 people were pardoned.
Morocco’s King Mohammed VI on Monday pardoned three journalists detained for years, as hundreds of prisoners saw their sentences commuted to mark the monarch’s 25th anniversary on the throne.
Omar Radi, Soulaimane Raissouni and Taoufik Bouachrine, as well as historian and rights advocate Maati Monjib, were among the 2,476 people pardoned, a government official said on condition on anonymity.
Rights groups including Reporters Without Borders (RSF) had denounced the jailings of Radi and Raissouni, detained since 2020 on charges of sexual assault they deny.
Human Rights Watch has accused Morocco of using criminal trials, especially for alleged sexual offences, as “techniques of repression” to silence journalists and government critics.
The country’s top court rejected in July 2023 the final appeals of two journalists.
Morocco ranked 129th out of 180 countries on RSF’s 2024 World Press Freedom Index.
Source: AFP
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