Paris, Feb 14, 2018 (SPS) - Two French lawyers of the Saharawi political prisoners of Gdeim Izik, expressed their utmost indignation after their expulsion from Morocco, on Tuesday after their detention at the Moroccan airport in Casablanca.
"We, Ingrid Metton and Olfa Ouled, attorneys of the Paris Bar Association, express our deepest indignation for the obstacles and impediments imposed in the exercise of our profession and the right to the defense of our clients," they said in a communiqué. French lawyers, adding that all their complaints filed in France have not been addressed to date.
The two French lawyers, said in their statement that they traveled to Morocco on Monday to visit their clients and were arrested when they got off the plane in Casablanca at 8:40 pm, and deprived of their passports and "under police escort" inside the international zone of the airport, for more than 18 hours before being expelled from the territory, "the statement said.
In May 2017, the two lawyers were violently evicted by police from the courtroom of the Rabat Court of Appeals during the exercise of their functions, in defense of the Saharawi political prisoners and Ouled was savagely assaulted causing several injuries.
The lawyers reaffirmed that defense must be exercised freely for everyone and everywhere because it is a fundamental principle of the legal profession and that they will continue to defend this principle throughout the world. SPS
125/090/TRA