A Moroccan court sentenced a journalist to eight months in prison on Wednesday and gave a suspended six-month sentence to his boss for publishing secret military intelligence documents.
The verdicts on Mustapha Hormat Allah of Al Watan al An and the weekly’s director, Abderrahim Ariri, came a week after a military court handed down stiff sentences to eight army officers involved.
Both journalists were also fined 1 000 dirhams ($120) for an article entitled ”Secret reports behind the state of alert in Morocco” in the July 14 edition of Al Watan al An.
The sentences, coming as Moroccan journalists fear they are under a crackdown by the authorities, were condemned by media representatives.
”We are shocked by the verdict. We had come to hear a verdict acquitting us, but instead we heard an unjust verdict,” Ariri said after the trial. ”We will meet with our lawyers and the organisations who came to our defence to decide what to do next.”
The secretary general of the national press trade union, Younes Moujahid called the verdict — the first prison term for a Moroccan journalist in four years — ”unacceptable”.
”It is a threat to all journalists, whose job is to publish reports and documents,” he said.
The president of the association of editors, Abdelmounauim Dilami, said: ”On principle, we strongly oppose all punishments depriving a journalist of his liberty for doing his job.”
On August 7, a military court sentenced army Captain Mohammed Maaji to five years in prison and a fine of 10 000 dirhams for violating military secrets and endangering state security by transmitting the documents to the journalists.
A former sergeant major in the military security branch, Hassan Bassine received the same sentence as Maaji, while six others, including three colonels, were given sentences ranging from two years in jail to six months suspended.
On August 24, another journalist will go on trial, accused of lack of respect for King Mohammed VI. Ahmed Benchemsi, director of magazines TelQuel and Nichane, criticised the king on his proposals for legislative elections on September 7.
The last time a journalist was sentenced to prison before the pair from Al Watan al An was for a similar offence of insulting the monarch in June 2003.
The government denies it is targeting journalists anew. — Sapa-AFP