Jailed leader eating again

Nasser Zefzafi, the jailed leader of a Moroccan protest movement, Hirak, has ended a hunger strike, six days after launching it in protest against prison conditions, his lawyer said.

Zefzafi, who led Hirak in Morocco’s marginalised north in 2016 and 2017, was handed a 20year jail term in June, along with three others for “plotting to undermine the security of the state”, the Daily Monitor reported yesterday.

Zefzafi’s hunger strike began on Friday last week at the Oukacha prison in Casablanca, where he is incarcerated. He undertook the strike to try and pressure authorities to take him out of solitary confinement and put him with other prisoners.

His lawyer was unable to confirm whether Zefzafi’s conditions had been met.

Protests began in 2016 after a fisherman, Mouhcine Fikri, was crushed to death in a rubbish truck when he tried to retrieve swordfish seized by authorities as it was caught out of season.

Unrest spread across the Rif region, where the marginalised Berber ethnic group is the majority, as they demanded jobs and development. Hundreds of people were arrested in connection with the protests but King Mohammed VI has since pardoned nearly 190 of them.

Zefzafi was arrested in May 2017. In June, he was among 53 Hirak members sentenced by a Casablanca court – most of whom were given jail terms of one to five years. – ANA