Front Line is concerned following reports that human rights defender Mr Chekib El-Khiari remains in detention after being arrested on 17 February 2009. Chekib El-Khiari is a journalist, the Head of the Association for Human Rights (AHR) in the Rif region of Morocco, and a defender of Amazigh (Berber) rights.

Further Information

On 17 February 2009, Chekib El-Khiari responded to a summons to report to the National Brigade of the Judicial Police in Casablanca, and was arrested there.

According to official statements issued after the arrest of Chekib El-Khiari, the General Crown Prosecutor of the Court of Appeals of Casablanca ordered the National Bureau of the Judicial Police to summon him because of public statements he had made in the national and international media regarding the implications of highranking State officials in drug trafficking in Rif, a region on the north coast of Morocco.

He was also reportedly being investigated for having accepted money from “foreign parties” in order to discredit the efforts made by Morrocan authorities to combat drug trafficking. During the morning of 18 February 2009, plainclothes police officers searched Chekib El-Khiari's home in Nador, in north-east Morocco, without showing a warrant. His computer and documents relating to the AHR were confiscated.

In a hearing on 21 February 2009, Investigative Judge Jamal Serhane questioned Chekib El-Khiari regarding allegations that he had “undermined” or insulted state institutions or officials. These allegations could lead to a fine and up to one year's imprisonment under Articles 263 and 265 of the Moroccan Penal Code.

Since 21 February 2009, Chekib El-Khiari has been held in a solitary cell in section 3 of Oukacha prison in Casablanca. He has not yet been formally charged and no date has been set for a second hearing with Investigative Judge Jamal Serhane. In the Rif region, local authorities have blocked efforts to organise peaceful activities to demand Chekib El-Khiari's release, including a sit-in planned by the Ussan Cultural Society for 18 March 2009 in front of the lower court in Midhar Town.

Front Line believes that Chekib El-Khiari has been detained solely because of his legitimate work in the defence of human rights, especially his work in relation to corruption and drug trafficking.