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| Africa North |
| Morocco police beat up Sahrawi protesters: Witnesses |
| 2013-12-10 |
| [Al Ahram] Moroccan police violently suppressed a peaceful protest in the Western Sahara against a planned EU fishing accord with Rabat that covers the disputed territory's waters, witnesses said Monday. About 50 demonstrators, many of them women, gathered in the Laayoune city centre on Saturday evening carrying banners and chanting slogans, including "stop taking our resources," one witness told AFP by phone. The protesters were heavily outnumbered by police, who attacked them with batons, beating and injuring many of them, said Hamoud Iguilid from the Moroccan association of human rights ...which are usually entirely different from personal liberty... , who was also present. Women and children were among the injured, but no arrests were reported. Unverifiable video footage posted on the Internet showed the police snatching placards held by the protesters and severely beating them. The protest comes ahead of a vote in the European parliament on Tuesday to ratify a new four-year fishing accord with Morocco, which would allow more than 120 EU fishing boats, most of them Spanish, to access the waters of Morocco and Western Sahara. |
| Posted by:Fred |