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/ 31 October 2006
Visitors to Morocco have often been tempted by pictures with the proverbial palm tree somewhere in the frame. But fewer and fewer of these trees are now around, and at this rate of decline the visitors of the future might not find any at all. The picture is changing; it is now of the Sahara desert advancing into once-green stretches.
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/ 7 September 2006
President Vladimir Putin visited Russia’s main African trading partner, Morocco, on Thursday, seeking to widen his sphere of political influence on the continent beyond Moscow’s traditional Cold War allies. The visit followed a two-day trip to South Africa where Putin pledged billions of dollars of investment.
The bodies of 28 illegal sub-Saharan migrants who had tried to reach the Canary Islands washed up on a beach in Western Sahara on Tuesday, Moroccan state news agency MAP reported. The migrants, who had set off from the Moroccan coast in two boats, were discovered in Blibilatte, 40km north of the territory’s chief city Laayoune.
When a fellow Moroccan asked Mohamed to drive him from Bilbao, Spain to Barcelona, Mohamed was happy to oblige. Two months later Mohamed was awakened by a heavy knock at his door. Police hauled him to Madrid, where he was accused of being an Islamic terrorist and of owning weapons.
European and African ministers said on Monday that the waves of illegal migrants seeking a better life in Europe would never be stopped until Europe helps Africa fight poverty. The ministers, meeting in Rabat to reach a plan on migration, were from 50 nations — grouping for the first time countries where migrants start out from, transit countries and the destinations.
Moroccan authorities have launched a wave of repression to stem the growing influence of an illegal Islamist movement, which many observers are already describing as the country’s biggest de-facto political party. Al Adl Wal Ihsane (Justice and Spirituality) is now so popular it would probably win elections if it was legalised and decided to enter politics, analysts said.
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Many soccer-crazed North Africans fear they could miss out on televised World Cup action because of the high fees levied on broadcasts of the event. officials and public TV executives in North Africa have been scrambling to strike deals with a Saudi Arabia broadcaster which has the rights to air the games in the Arab world.
Women trained as religious guides in a pioneer programme are not authorised to lead prayers or to hold the post of imam, Morocco’s official religious authority has ruled. The fatwa came weeks after Morocco’s first 50 female ”morchidat,” religious guides, completed training by the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, which oversees Morocco’s mosques.
”This is Omar Maarouf calling from Kenitra Central Prison,” said the dejected voice on the other end of the line. The bizarre phone call was the second in two days from a prisoner inside the high-walled Kenitra, one of Morocco’s most notorious lockups.
European intelligence services have warned Morocco that terrorists are planning attacks on political, business and tourist targets in the North African country, the Al Ahdath Al Maghribia newspaper said on Tuesday. ”Moroccan security authorities received a message from their European counterparts warning of [potential] attacks,” the newspaper said, quoting ”well-informed sources”.
Moroccan authorities said on Sunday 78 would-be immigrants were arrested on the beach in the northern town of Nador as they were getting ready to embark for Spain. The Moroccan migrants seeking to enter Spain illegally were picked up after they had to abandon their plans to cross the Mediterranean to Spain because of rough seas.
In its 28-year history, the Dakar Rally has criss-crossed most of North Africa, but the gruelling event is still waiting for an African competitor to take the race by storm. Only 12 African competitors were at the start line in Lisbon on December 31 for the start of the 2006 edition. In 2005, it had been 18.
Spain’s former two-time world rally champion Carlos Sainz captured his third stage of the Dakar Rally in Morocco on Tuesday to regain the overall lead. The 43-year-old Volkswagen driver won the fourth stage in three hours, 52 minutes and 48 seconds to lead overall by 4:51 from Frenchman Bruno Saby and by 5:09 from German Jutta Kleinschmidt.
Australia’s Andy Caldecott, riding a KTM, won the third stage of the Dakar Rally from Nador to Er Rachidia on Monday, fully justifying his late call-up to the race. Caldecott won the 314km timed section in three hours, 21 minutes and 11 seconds from American Andy Grider by 3:04 and by 3:06 from Cyril Despres of France.
Morocco complained on Thursday that international aid to help it fight off a plague of locusts threatening its crops has fallen far short of what is needed. Since June 30 on average 106 000 hectares a day have been infested and swarms are heading south, in particular to Mauritania, Mali and Senegal.
Five Moroccan left-wing parties have set up a new grouping called the Rally of the Democratic Left (RGD), the main aim of which is to lay the groundwork for a fully-fledged political party, the group said on Wednesday. ”A left-wing party … based on a multiplicity of ideologies has not yet been tested in our country,” an RGD spokesperson said.
Greedy officials diverted aid intended for victims of Morocco’s deadly earthquake for their own use, according to a local leader and residents of a town where police arrested two people accused of fraudulently manipulating the relief effort. Two men have been arrested on suspicion of stashing away aid consignments.
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/ 25 February 2004
Aid and development groups on Wednesday pointed an accusing finger at construction firms over the high death toll in the earthquake that rocked northeast Morocco, saying they ignored the building code for the quake-prone region. At least 560 people died in the quake on Tuesday.
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/ 25 February 2004
More than 20 aftershocks rattled northwestern Morocco through the night and into Wednesday morning in the wake of the killer earthquake on Tuesday that claimed more than 560 lives in the region of Al Hoceima. One of the aftershocks measured 4,2 on the Richter scale, after the primary quake that registered 6,3.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=31755">Flouting of building law blamed</a>
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/ 24 February 2004
A powerful earthquake measuring more than six points on the Richter scale struck northern Morocco overnight on Tuesday, killing at least 300 people. Local rescue workers and medical staff said several hundred people were injured. The death toll was expected to rise throughout the day, the Interior Ministry said.
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/ 15 January 2004
A parliamentary commission in Morocco has unanimously recommended a new family code putting wives on a more equal footing with their husbands, officials said on Thursday. The legal age at which girls can marry will be raised from 15 to 18 and polygamy will be permitted only under highly restrictive conditions.
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/ 5 November 2003
It has not been a good week for press freedom in Africa: three journalists in Morocco have been given jail sentences; an Algerian court has handed down sentences to a journalist and an editor, and an AFP reporter in Equatorial Guinea has been detained.