Latest news with #AMDH
Morocco World
9 hours ago
- Morocco World
Authorities Detain Suspect in Gang Rape of 13-Year-Old Boy at Moulay Abdellah Festival
Rabat – Moroccan authorities have arrested a suspect in connection with the brutal gang rape of a 13-year-old boy during the annual Moulay Abdellah Amghar festival in El Jadida province. The Attorney General at the Court of Appeal in El Jadida announced on Tuesday that an adult man has been placed in police custody on suspicion of involvement in the crime. In a statement, the attorney general confirmed that the identities of other suspects have been determined and that investigations are still underway to locate them. A judicial inquiry has been opened into the case. On Monday, the child underwent a forensic medical examination and gave his testimony in the presence of his mother. Authorities stressed that judicial and security services are continuing their efforts to uncover all the circumstances and identify everyone responsible. A vile and devastating crime The case involves a 13-year-old boy from Youssoufia who lost his father and whose mother suffers from a serious mental illness. He attended the festival with a group of young men from Youssoufia, Sidi Bennour, and Sidi Ahmed. According to reports, the boy was repeatedly drugged and sexually abused over several days, beginning on Tuesday of the festival week. When he regained consciousness, he discovered that 14 men had assaulted him. After returning home on Friday, the boy revealed what had happened to his neighbors, who often care for him due to his mother's illness. They immediately reported the case to the police and took him to the provincial hospital in Youssoufia. Because of his serious condition, he was later transferred to Mohammed VI University Hospital in Marrakech for specialized treatment. Human rights groups demand action The Moroccan Association for Human Rights (AMDH) has strongly condemned the crime, describing it as a grave violation of children's rights and Moroccan law. In a letter signed by Mohamed Yassir, head of AMDH's local committee in Youssoufia, the association urged the Attorney General in Rabat to ensure accountability for all perpetrators and justice for the victim. AMDH also noted Morocco's obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and called for stronger protection mechanisms for minors, including special units to protect women and children from sexual violence. The group further demanded psychological support for the victim. The case has sparked anger and disbelief among Moroccans, many of whom took to social media to denounce the crime and question how such an incident could occur at a major cultural festival attended by thousands. 'We cannot stay silent about these crimes, especially the rape of minors and childs which destroys their entire lives,' a social media user said. Some also claimed that the festival has previously been associated with abuse, drug use, and superstitious practices. Tags: Child Rapegang rapeMoroccorape
Morocco World
12 hours ago
- Morocco World
Moroccans Demand Justice for 13-Year-old Boy Victim of Gang Rape by 14 Men
Rabat – A teenage boy was the victim of a brutal gang rape during the annual Moulay Abdellah Amghar festival in El Jadida province. The child, referred to as W.B . , is a 13-year-old boy who lost his father and whose mother suffers from a serious mental illness. He attended the festival accompanied by a group of young men from Youssoufia, Sifi Benour, and Sifi Ahmed. During the event, some of these individuals repeatedly drugged and sexually abused him. When the boy regained consciousness, he discovered that 14 men had assaulted him over the course of several days, beginning on Tuesday. After returning to his hometown of Youssoufia on Friday, the boy, in a severely distressed psychological state, revealed the abuse to his neighbors, who usually look after him as his mother is ill. The neighbors immediately reported the case to the police and accompanied him to the provincial hospital in Youssoufia. Due to the severity of his condition, doctors transferred him to the Mohammed VI University Hospital in Marrakesh for specialized treatment. The shocking case has caused outrage in Morocco, with the Moroccan Association for Human Rights (AMDH) calling on the Attorney General in Rabat to open an urgent investigation, identify those responsible, and hold them legally accountable. Local sources said the child's health quickly worsened, and he began showing signs of severe psychological trauma, even speaking in a hallucinatory state. Read also: Israeli Pedophile Found Hiding Out in Morocco In a letter signed by Mohamed Yassir, head of AMDH's local committee in Youssoufia, the association stressed that sexual assault against children is a serious human rights violation and a crime under Moroccan law. The group also noted Morocco's obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, urging the state to ensure full protection for minors from exploitation and violence. The association further demanded that the government activate special units for the protection of women and children from sexual abuse, provide the young victim with psychological treatment, and ensure justice for him and his family. Moroccans took to social media to express their outrage at the shocking incident, questioning how such a tragedy could take place in the middle of a major cultural festival attended by thousands of people. Several social media users claimed that the festival has previously seen incidents of abuse, drug use, and activities linked to superstition. The public is now calling for a thorough investigation and strict punishment for all those involved. Tags: gang rapeMoroccorapeyoussoufia
Ya Biladi
01-07-2025
- Ya Biladi
Gang rape in El Attaouia defendants appeal for lighter sentences despite DNA evidence
Last April, three men convicted in the gang rape of a 13-year-old girl in El Attaouia, a town in El Kelaa des Sraghna Province, received sentences lighter than those prescribed by law. The Marrakech Court of Appeal sentenced them to 12, 10, and 8 years in prison, along with a total compensation of 200,000 dirhams for the victim. Said Fadili, head of the El Attaouia branch of the Moroccan Association for Human Rights (AMDH), confirmed to Yabiladi on Monday that the defendants have appealed to the Supreme Court, suspending the execution of the verdict until a final decision is rendered. Although the appeal court increased the prison terms by two years compared to the initial ruling in February, the sentences remain lenient in light of the severity of the crime, the legal provisions in place, and the aggravating circumstances. Under Moroccan law, indecent assault on a minor, particularly when committed against a person with a mental disability and resulting in childbirth, is punishable by 20 to 30 years in prison. «That is why, both at first instance and on appeal, we argued for the maximum penalty of 30 years, as provided by the Penal Code in such cases», Fadili stated. The association reiterated its call for «zero tolerance» for «crimes of rape, pedophilia, and the sexual exploitation of children», and emphasized the need for harsher sentences, especially since this case echoes that of a similar gang rape in Tiflet, where sentences were also revised on appeal. «The DNA Test Must Lead to Legal Filiation» Also contacted by Yabiladi, Omar Arbib, president of AMDH's Marrakech-Menara branch, said the NGO plans to return to court. «Yes, the appeal increased the prison terms, and the compensation for the victim was doubled. But the sentences are still below the legal minimum, especially considering the prosecution itself ordered a DNA test that linked the main accused to the newborn with 99.9999% certainty», he explained. Now that the case is headed to the Supreme Court, the association—acting as a civil party—insists the DNA test must not serve only to identify a main perpetrator. It must also secure the civil rights of the child, including a name and legal identity. «We will pursue legal action beyond the gang rape case to establish filiation. The outcome of this case should also recognize the rights of the mother, who is herself a minor. Meanwhile, the issue of DNA-based filiation remains unresolved in the debate around Morocco's family code reform», Arbib said. Also serving as AMDH vice president, Arbib expressed dismay at the defense strategy. «During the trial, the main accused was confronted with DNA results confirming the link. Yet even faced with 99.9999% certainty, he completely denied paternity», he said, adding that «this is about the child's best interest». The association believes this case should reignite a long-overdue debate around legal recognition of filiation for children born out of wedlock, especially in cases involving rape of minors. «We're facing a clash of perspectives—between a theological view that resists DNA-based filiation, legal recommendations focused on the child's best interest, and contradictory institutional positions. But at the heart of it all is the fate of thousands of children, who risk being treated as second-class citizens», Arbib stressed.
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
‘Xenophobic': Neighbours outraged over Mauritania's mass migrant pushback
Their situation seemed desperate; their demeanour, portrayed in several videos published by news outlets, was sour. On a recent weekday in March, men, women, and even children – all with their belongings heaped on their heads or strapped to their bodies – disembarked from the ferry they say they were forcibly hauled onto from the vast northwest African nation of Mauritania to the Senegalese town of Rosso, on the banks of the Senegal River. Their offence? Being migrants from the region, they told reporters, regardless of whether they had legal residency papers. 'We suffered there,' one woman told France's TV5 Monde, a baby perched on her hip. 'It was really bad.' The deportees are among hundreds of West Africans who have been rounded up by Mauritanian security forces, detained, and sent over the border to Senegal and Mali in recent months, human rights groups say. According to one estimate from the Mauritanian Association for Human Rights (AMDH),1,200 people were pushed back in March alone, even though about 700 of them had residence permits. Those pushed back told reporters about being randomly approached for questioning before being arrested, detained for days in tight prison cells with insufficient food and water, and tortured. Many people remained in prison in Mauritania, they said. The largely desert country – which has signed expensive deals with the European Union to keep migrants from taking the risky boat journey across the Atlantic Ocean to Western shores – has called the pushbacks necessary to crack down on human smuggling networks. However, its statements have done little to calm rare anger from its neighbours, Mali and Senegal, whose citizens make up a huge number of those sent back. Mali's government, in a statement in March, expressed 'indignation' at the treatment of its nationals, adding that 'the conditions of arrest are in flagrant violation of human rights and the rights of migrants in particular.' In Senegal, a member of parliament called the pushbacks 'xenophobic' and urged the government to launch an investigation. 'We've seen these kinds of pushbacks in the past but it is at an intensity we've never seen before in terms of the number of people deported and the violence used,' Hassan Ould Moctar, a migration researcher at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London, told Al Jazeera. The blame, the researcher said, was largely to be put on the EU. On one hand, Mauritania was likely under pressure from Brussels, and on the other hand, it was also likely reacting to controversial rumours that migrants deported from Europe would be resettled in the country despite Nouakchott's denial of such an agreement. Mauritania, on the edge of the Atlantic, is one of the closest points from the continent to Spain's Canary Islands. That makes it a popular departure point for migrants who crowd the coastal capital, Nouakchott, and the commercial northern city of Nouadhibou. Most are trying to reach the Canaries, a Spanish enclave closer to the African continent than to Europe, from where they can seek asylum. Due to its role as a transit hub, the EU has befriended Nouakchott – as well as the major transit points of Morocco and Senegal – since the 2000s, pumping funds to enable security officials there to prevent irregular migrants from embarking on the crossing. However, the EU honed in on Mauritania with renewed vigour last year after the number of people travelling from the country shot up to unusual levels, making it the number one departure point. About 83 percent of the 7,270 people who arrived in the Canaries in January 2024 travelled from Mauritania, migrant advocacy group Caminando Fronteras (CF) noted in a report last year. That number represented a 1,184 percent increase compared with January 2023, when most people were leaving Senegal. Some 3,600 died on the Mauritania-Atlantic route between January and April 2024, CF noted. Analysts, and the EU, link the surge to upheavals wracking the Sahel, from Mali to Niger, including coups and attacks by several armed groups looking to build caliphates. In Mali, attacks on local communities by armed groups and government forces suspicious of locals have forced hundreds over the border into Mauritania in recent weeks. Ibrahim Drame of the Senegalese Red Cross in the border town of Rosso told Al Jazeera the migrant raids began in January after a new immigration law went into force, requiring a residence permit for any foreigner living on Mauritanian soil. However, he said most people have not had an opportunity to apply for those permits. Before this, nationals of countries like Senegal and Mali enjoyed free movement under bilateral agreements. 'Raids have been organised day and night, in large markets, around bus stations, and on the main streets,' Drame noted, adding that those affected are receiving dwindling shelter and food support from the Red Cross, and included migrants from Togo, Nigeria, Niger, The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea Conakry, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ghana and Benin. 'Hundreds of them were even hunted down in their homes or workplaces, without receiving the slightest explanation … mainly women, children, people with chronic illnesses in a situation of extreme vulnerability and stripped of all their belongings, even their mobile phones,' Drame said. Last February, European Commission head, Ursula von der Leyen, visited President Mohamed Ould Ghazouani in Nouakchott to sign a 210 million euro ($235m) 'migrant partnership agreement'. The EU said the agreement was meant to intensify 'border security cooperation' with Frontex, the EU border agency, and dismantle smuggler networks. The bloc has promised an additional 4 million euros ($4.49m) this year to provide food, medical, and psychosocial support to migrants. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez was also in Mauritania in August to sign a separate border security agreement. Black Mauritanians in the country, meanwhile, say the pushback campaign has awakened feelings of exclusion and forced displacement carried by their communities. Some fear the deportations may be directed at them. Activist Abdoulaye Sow, founder of the US-based Mauritanian Network for Human Rights in the US (MNHRUS), told Al Jazeera that to understand why Black people in the country feel threatened, there's a need to understand the country's painful past. Located at a confluence where the Arab world meets Sub-Saharan Africa, Mauritania has historically been racially segregated, with the Arab-Berber political elite dominating over the Black population, some of whom were previously, or are still, enslaved. It was only in 1981 that Mauritania passed a law abolishing slavery, but the practice still exists, according to rights groups. Dark-skinned Black Mauritanians are composed of Haratines, an Arabic-speaking group descended from formerly enslaved peoples. There are also non-Arabic speaking groups like the Fulani and Wolof, who are predominantly from the Senegal border area in the country's south. Black Mauritanians, Sow said, were once similarly deported en masse in trucks from the country to Senegal. It dates back to April 1989, when simmering tensions between Mauritanian herders and Senegalese farmers in border communities erupted and led to the 1989-1991 Border War between the two countries. Both sides deployed their militaries in heavy gunfire battles. In Senegal, mobs attacked Mauritanian traders, and in Mauritania, security forces cracked down on Senegalese nationals. Because a Black liberation movement was also growing at the time, and the Mauritanian military government was fearful of a coup, it cracked down on Black Mauritanians, too. By 1991, there were refugees on either side in the thousands. However, after peace came about, the Mauritanian government expelled thousands of Black Mauritanians under the guise of repatriating Senegalese refugees. Some 60,000 people were forced into Senegal. Many lost important citizenship and property documents in the process. 'I was a victim too,' Sow said. 'It wasn't safe for Blacks who don't speak Arabic. I witnessed armed people going house to house and asking people if they were Mauritanian, beating them, even killing them.' Sow said it is why the deportation of sub-Saharan migrants is scaring the community. Although he has written open letters to the government warning of how Black people could be affected, he said there has been no response. 'When they started these recent deportations again, I knew where they were going, and we've already heard of a Black Mauritanian deported to Mali. We've been sounding the alarm for so long, but the government is not responsive.' The Mauritanian government directed Al Jazeera to an earlier statement it released regarding the deportations, but did not address allegations of possible forced expulsions of Black Mauritanians. In the statement, the government said it welcomed legal migrants from neighbouring countries, and that it was targeting irregular migrants and smuggling networks. 'Mauritania has made significant efforts to enable West African nationals to regularise their residence status by obtaining resident cards following simplified procedures,' the statement read. Although Mauritania eventually agreed to take back its nationals between 2007 and 2012, many Afro-Mauritanians still do not have documents proving their citizenship as successive administrations implement fluctuating documentation and census laws. Tens of thousands are presently stateless, Sow said. At least 16,000 refugees chose to stay back in Senegal to avoid persecution in Mauritania. Sow said the fear of another forced deportation comes on top of other issues, including national laws that require students in all schools to learn in Arabic, irrespective of their culture. Arabic is Mauritania's lingua franca, but Afro-Mauritanians who speak languages like Wolof or Pula are against what they call 'forced Arabisation'. Sow says it is 'cultural genocide'. Despite new residence permit laws in place, Sow added, migrants, as well as the Black Mauritanian population, should be protected. 'Whether they are migrants or not, they have their rights as people, as humans,' he said.
Al Jazeera
16-05-2025
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
‘Xenophobic': Neighbours outraged over Mauritania's mass migrant pushback
Their situation seemed desperate; their demeanour, portrayed in several videos published by news outlets, was sour. On a recent weekday in March, men, women, and even children – all with their belongings heaped on their heads or strapped to their bodies – disembarked from the ferry they say they were forcibly hauled onto from the vast northwest African nation of Mauritania to the Senegalese town of Rosso, on the banks of the Senegal River. Their offence? Being migrants from the region, they told reporters, regardless of whether they had legal residency papers. 'We suffered there,' one woman told France's TV5 Monde, a baby perched on her hip. 'It was really bad.' The deportees are among hundreds of West Africans who have been rounded up by Mauritanian security forces, detained, and sent over the border to Senegal and Mali in recent months, human rights groups say. According to one estimate from the Mauritanian Association for Human Rights (AMDH),1,200 people were pushed back in March alone, even though about 700 of them had residence permits. Those pushed back told reporters about being randomly approached for questioning before being arrested, detained for days in tight prison cells with insufficient food and water, and tortured. Many people remained in prison in Mauritania, they said. The largely desert country – which has signed expensive deals with the European Union to keep migrants from taking the risky boat journey across the Atlantic Ocean to Western shores – has called the pushbacks necessary to crack down on human smuggling networks. However, its statements have done little to calm rare anger from its neighbours, Mali and Senegal, whose citizens make up a huge number of those sent back. Mali's government, in a statement in March, expressed 'indignation' at the treatment of its nationals, adding that 'the conditions of arrest are in flagrant violation of human rights and the rights of migrants in particular.' In Senegal, a member of parliament called the pushbacks 'xenophobic' and urged the government to launch an investigation. 'We've seen these kinds of pushbacks in the past but it is at an intensity we've never seen before in terms of the number of people deported and the violence used,' Hassan Ould Moctar, a migration researcher at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London, told Al Jazeera. The blame, the researcher said, was largely to be put on the EU. On one hand, Mauritania was likely under pressure from Brussels, and on the other hand, it was also likely reacting to controversial rumours that migrants deported from Europe would be resettled in the country despite Nouakchott's denial of such an agreement. Mauritania, on the edge of the Atlantic, is one of the closest points from the continent to Spain's Canary Islands. That makes it a popular departure point for migrants who crowd the coastal capital, Nouakchott, and the commercial northern city of Nouadhibou. Most are trying to reach the Canaries, a Spanish enclave closer to the African continent than to Europe, from where they can seek asylum. Due to its role as a transit hub, the EU has befriended Nouakchott – as well as the major transit points of Morocco and Senegal – since the 2000s, pumping funds to enable security officials there to prevent irregular migrants from embarking on the crossing. However, the EU honed in on Mauritania with renewed vigour last year after the number of people travelling from the country shot up to unusual levels, making it the number one departure point. About 83 percent of the 7,270 people who arrived in the Canaries in January 2024 travelled from Mauritania, migrant advocacy group Caminando Fronteras (CF) noted in a report last year. That number represented a 1,184 percent increase compared with January 2023, when most people were leaving Senegal. Some 3,600 died on the Mauritania-Atlantic route between January and April 2024, CF noted. Analysts, and the EU, link the surge to upheavals wracking the Sahel, from Mali to Niger, including coups and attacks by several armed groups looking to build caliphates. In Mali, attacks on local communities by armed groups and government forces suspicious of locals have forced hundreds over the border into Mauritania in recent weeks. Ibrahim Drame of the Senegalese Red Cross in the border town of Rosso told Al Jazeera the migrant raids began in January after a new immigration law went into force, requiring a residence permit for any foreigner living on Mauritanian soil. However, he said most people have not had an opportunity to apply for those permits. Before this, nationals of countries like Senegal and Mali enjoyed free movement under bilateral agreements. 'Raids have been organised day and night, in large markets, around bus stations, and on the main streets,' Drame noted, adding that those affected are receiving dwindling shelter and food support from the Red Cross, and included migrants from Togo, Nigeria, Niger, The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea Conakry, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ghana and Benin. 'Hundreds of them were even hunted down in their homes or workplaces, without receiving the slightest explanation … mainly women, children, people with chronic illnesses in a situation of extreme vulnerability and stripped of all their belongings, even their mobile phones,' Drame said. Last February, European Commission head, Ursula von der Leyen, visited President Mohamed Ould Ghazouani in Nouakchott to sign a 210 million euro ($235m) 'migrant partnership agreement'. The EU said the agreement was meant to intensify 'border security cooperation' with Frontex, the EU border agency, and dismantle smuggler networks. The bloc has promised an additional 4 million euros ($4.49m) this year to provide food, medical, and psychosocial support to migrants. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez was also in Mauritania in August to sign a separate border security agreement. Black Mauritanians in the country, meanwhile, say the pushback campaign has awakened feelings of exclusion and forced displacement carried by their communities. Some fear the deportations may be directed at them. Activist Abdoulaye Sow, founder of the US-based Mauritanian Network for Human Rights in the US (MNHRUS), told Al Jazeera that to understand why Black people in the country feel threatened, there's a need to understand the country's painful past. Located at a confluence where the Arab world meets Sub-Saharan Africa, Mauritania has historically been racially segregated, with the Arab-Berber political elite dominating over the Black population, some of whom were previously, or are still, enslaved. It was only in 1981 that Mauritania passed a law abolishing slavery, but the practice still exists, according to rights groups. Dark-skinned Black Mauritanians are composed of Haratines, an Arabic-speaking group descended from formerly enslaved peoples. There are also non-Arabic speaking groups like the Fulani and Wolof, who are predominantly from the Senegal border area in the country's south. Black Mauritanians, Sow said, were once similarly deported en masse in trucks from the country to Senegal. It dates back to April 1989, when simmering tensions between Mauritanian herders and Senegalese farmers in border communities erupted and led to the 1989-1991 Border War between the two countries. Both sides deployed their militaries in heavy gunfire battles. In Senegal, mobs attacked Mauritanian traders, and in Mauritania, security forces cracked down on Senegalese nationals. Because a Black liberation movement was also growing at the time, and the Mauritanian military government was fearful of a coup, it cracked down on Black Mauritanians, too. By 1991, there were refugees on either side in the thousands. However, after peace came about, the Mauritanian government expelled thousands of Black Mauritanians under the guise of repatriating Senegalese refugees. Some 60,000 people were forced into Senegal. Many lost important citizenship and property documents in the process. 'I was a victim too,' Sow said. 'It wasn't safe for Blacks who don't speak Arabic. I witnessed armed people going house to house and asking people if they were Mauritanian, beating them, even killing them.' Sow said it is why the deportation of sub-Saharan migrants is scaring the community. Although he has written open letters to the government warning of how Black people could be affected, he said there has been no response. 'When they started these recent deportations again, I knew where they were going, and we've already heard of a Black Mauritanian deported to Mali. We've been sounding the alarm for so long, but the government is not responsive.' The Mauritanian government directed Al Jazeera to an earlier statement it released regarding the deportations, but did not address allegations of possible forced expulsions of Black Mauritanians. In the statement, the government said it welcomed legal migrants from neighbouring countries, and that it was targeting irregular migrants and smuggling networks. 'Mauritania has made significant efforts to enable West African nationals to regularise their residence status by obtaining resident cards following simplified procedures,' the statement read. Although Mauritania eventually agreed to take back its nationals between 2007 and 2012, many Afro-Mauritanians still do not have documents proving their citizenship as successive administrations implement fluctuating documentation and census laws. Tens of thousands are presently stateless, Sow said. At least 16,000 refugees chose to stay back in Senegal to avoid persecution in Mauritania. Sow said the fear of another forced deportation comes on top of other issues, including national laws that require students in all schools to learn in Arabic, irrespective of their culture. Arabic is Mauritania's lingua franca, but Afro-Mauritanians who speak languages like Wolof or Pula are against what they call 'forced Arabisation'. Sow says it is 'cultural genocide'. Despite new residence permit laws in place, Sow added, migrants, as well as the Black Mauritanian population, should be protected. 'Whether they are migrants or not, they have their rights as people, as humans,' he said.
