London, February 23, 2017 (SPS) - The Moroccan Authorities continued to repress the peaceful demonstrations in Western Sahara in 2016, and to expel journalists, foreign activists and human rights activists and to bar them entry to this territory, said the latest annual report of Amnesty International, published on Tuesday.
In its assessment of the world’s human rights in 2016, Amnesty International underlined that the Moroccan forces initiated criminal proceedings against the Sahrawi activists who called for the organization of a referendum on Western Sahara peoples’ self-determination and denounced the human rights abuses, and submitted these activists to “restrictions.”
Human rights defenders were questioned upon their return from abroad by the Moroccan authorities who also expelled from Western Sahara journalists and foreign activists as well as human rights defenders, according the report.
The non-governmental organization cited the expulsion of a delegation made up of a Belgian jurist, a Spanish judge and French and Spanish lawyers who went, in April, to Rabat to make representations on behalf of Gdeim Izik prisoners.
The report also underlines that Sahrawi people, arrested by the Moroccan security forces for peaceful demonstrations, were victims of torture and ill-treatment SPS
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