http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/4537870.stm
Last Updated: Saturday, 17 December 2005, 13:49 GMT
Morocco abuse report criticised
Nearly 17,000 people filed claims of abuse
A human rights group has criticised Morocco's truth commission for not
naming abuse perpetrators during the rule of the late King Hassan II.
The Moroccan Association for Human Rights has made its own list of those
it wants prosecuted for the abuses.
It also queried the figures provided by the investigating commission,
which said 592 people were killed during the repression of 1956 to 1999.
The panel's report by is the first of its kind in the Arab world.
The document - yet to be released in full - is the result of a two-year
investigation.
The 17-member Equity and Reconciliation Committee (IER), set up in
January 2004, heard from 16,861 people, and assessed whether victims should be
given compensation and how much they should receive.
Human rights groups want those responsible to be named
A summary of the IER report said that it had recommended 9,280 victims
were entitled to payments.
The commission found that 322 people had been shot dead by government
troops in protests, and that 174 people had died in arbitrary detention.
The report said political figures opposed to King Hassan II had also
disappeared without trace, including the main opposition leader in the 1960s,
Mehdi Ben Barka.
The graves of 85 people, who had been detained in secret prisons, were
also identified.
Disputed figures
While welcoming the report as a good start, the Moroccan Association for
Human Rights criticised its authors for not naming and shaming the perpetrators
of abuse.
Morocco's King Mohammed VI has authorised the report
The group also queried the IER's figures.
"The figures cited by the IER are far from the reality," the group's
Abdullah Abdeslam said.
"According to the data we have, 1,500 people had been killed in the
protests of 21 March 1965, and between 500 and 1,000 died in the protests of
1981."
Even before the IER publishes its report, the Moroccan news agency, Map,
has been detailing some of its content - and that could only happen with the
tacit approval at the highest official level, the BBC's Africa editor David
Bamford reports.
The IER report has urged the state to apologise to the victims and their
families, and King Mohammed VI - having authorised the document - is likely to
do this in the near future, our correspondent says.
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