(RSF/IFEX) – Reporters Without Borders has called for the immediate release of imprisoned journalist Abderrahmane El Badraoui, who began an indefinite hunger strike on 7 October 2005 in protest against his transfer on 5 October to Mohdya prison, near Casablanca, 150 km from Rabat, where his family lives. The former editor of the weekly “Al-Moulahid […]
(RSF/IFEX) – Reporters Without Borders has called for the immediate release of imprisoned journalist Abderrahmane El Badraoui, who began an indefinite hunger strike on 7 October 2005 in protest against his transfer on 5 October to Mohdya prison, near Casablanca, 150 km from Rabat, where his family lives.
The former editor of the weekly “Al-Moulahid Assiyassi” (“The Political Observatory”), Badraoui had until then been held in Salé prison, just outside Rabat. He has been detained since January 2002.
“This journalist became a nuisance by incriminating senior police officers and has been held for more than three years on false pretences, the victim of a conviction engineered by people he had exposed,” Reporters Without Borders said.
Reached by telephone, Badraoui’s lawyer told Reporters Without Borders that his imprisonment was the result of a “judicial blunder.” The lawyer, Abdelsammad Lemrabet, said, “He has been tried twice on the same charges, which proves there was a procedural irregularity.”
Conditions in Mohdya prison are terrible. The daily food ration is only half a baguette of bread. Badraoui, who has a bad back, had to pay 500 dirhams (46 euros) for his “place” in the prison. Inmates cannot get medicine or see a doctor. Since his transfer eight days ago, he has been allowed to see his wife for only five minutes.
Badraoui was held with political prisoners in Salé prison. But in Mohdya, he has been placed in a 40-square-metre cell with 38 common criminals. It seems the decision to transfer him was taken because, with the help of a friend outside prison, he had managed to set up a website (http://almoulahid.ifrance.com) from Salé prison in which he criticised his imprisonment.
