Awhile back, you may recall, I sent a round of e-mails out regarding the Rabat Zoo.  I was sure  I’d posted about it here, but a quick search revealed nothing.  Anyhow, here are some examples of the horror:

Most zoo exhibits elsewhere would not include Assiri containers.

Steve Irwin is rolling over in his grave (no harm intended).

That water’s not fit for stray dogs!

That is indeed a sheep, two zebras, and a few cows. Interesting choice.

I’m not an elephant expert, but he just doesn’t look all that healthy to me.

Anyhow, I contacted plenty of people about this.  I got responses from PETA, The Humane Society of the U.S. and SPANA.  Unfortunately, the former two couldn’t do a whole lot (though Carly Ikuma at Humane Society International referred me to SPANA, who were ultimately able to help).

SPANA, however, sent me an e-mail today, with the following quote from their Technical director:

“Although we have not had any other formal complaints recently I did spend some time at the zoo recently. Although it is undoubtedly under resourced, in need of maintenance, has some questionable feeding practices and some of the animals are undoubtedly too confined, I did not see any obviously sick or undernourished and all had drinking water. You would not ideally keep animals in some of the enclosures / cages and I hope this will change when the zoo moves location. SPANA Morocco has made itself available to assist and advise on planning at any stage.  We have always kept contact with the zoo staff and will continue to pass on any concerns and hope that future co-operation can improve things for these animals long term.”

Insha’allah, word will be kept.

A Moroccan council has proposed autonomy for Western Sahara, an action which is likely to fuel tension with the Polisario, reports Reuters.

For months, Morocco has been planning this proposal; clearly there is little hope that Morocco will accept the Polisario Front’s bid for independence for the Saharawis.  Khali Henna Ould Errachid, chairman of the Royal Consultative Council for Sahara Affairs said today, “The draft plan offers a solution to the territory’s problem on the basis of an autonomy.  It offers self-determination via autonomy but it does not propose a self-determination that leads to separation and independence…The plan would be a final and complete solution to Western Sahara because it satisfies all the historic demands of the Saharawis.”

So long as the King is receptive, the Moroccan government will work on garnering support for autonomy in Morocco and throughout the diaspora.

The Western Sahara was annexed by Morocco in 1975 after Spain withdrew from the region.  The area is quite rich in phosphates and fisheries.  Since 1991, the region has been subject to a U.N. ceasefire however, conflict with the Polisario Front (which is backed by Algeria) continues.  The agreement promised Saharawis the opportunity to vote in a referendum on independence but such a vote has never occurred.

Ould Errachid stated that “Polisario fears our plan.  They see it as a tsunami because it offers an alternative to the Saharawis.”  He also claimed that one of the aims of the proposal is to put pressures on Polisario’s leadership in the hope of weakening it and its support by the Saharawis.  Ould Errachid also claimed that only 800-1,000 Saharawis are truly in support of the Polisario; the rest support autonomy.

Ellison wishes to use Qur’an, rather than Bible, to swear in.

So let him.  End of story.

From the Sahara Presse Service:

SADR/MOROCCO/OCCUPATION

Polisario Front warns against a new “Srebrenica” in Western Sahara      

03.12.06

London, 03/12/2006 (SPS) Polisario Front warned the international community against a possible massacre in the Western Sahara Occidental, similar to that of Srebrenica in Bosnia-Herzegovina, indicated Saharawi members of the Pan African Parliament, who were participating Thursday to a conference on the “human rights situation in the occupied cities of Western Sahara“.

The enlargement of the mandate of the Minurso to include the defence of the human rights in the Western Sahara will answer the claims of Polisario Front and of many international human rights organisations, the Saharawi Parliamentarians indicated in a statement to the London’s Bureau of the Algerian Press Service, APS.

“Seen the explosive situation in the Western Sahara due to the odious policy of oppression of the Saharawi people’s peaceful intifada, any delay in the enlargement of the mandate of the Minurso get us close to a second Srebrenica”, the Saharawi Ambassador to South Africa had declared in his intervention during the aforementioned conference.

The South African Committee for Human Rights organised on Thursday a seminar under the theme “the human rights situation in the occupied territories of the Western Sahara” and declared the “emergency of enlarging the mandate of the MINURSO”, according to a press release issued by the Saharawi Ambassador to South Africa, it should be recalled.

The seminar, which was organised at the seat of the South African human rights organisation, was attended by representatives of the diplomatic corps in Pretoria, representatives of South African political parties, NGOS, searchers and journalists, the press release indicated.

In his intervention, Mr. Mtselsio Thipanyane, Executive Director of the Committee put forward “the serious human rights violations in the occupied territories of the Western Sahara, perpetrated by Morocco, which are periodically denounced in international reports and in concordant testimonies of Saharawi citizens”.

“This is a major concern for our organisation and our seminar aims to put the head lines of a work programme that will be organised in coordination with our partners to ensure a better defence of Saharawis, so as to consecrate the Saharawi people’s right to self-determination and independence”, he added.

During the seminar, many personalities intervened, including Mr. Ebrahim Saley, Director of the Department of North Africa in the South African FA Ministry, Mr. Eddy Makue, Secretary General of the South African Council of Churches, Mr. Oubbi Bouchraya Bachir, Saharawi Ambassador to South Africa, Mr. Timothey Othieno, from the Institute of Global Dialogue and Mr. Ali Salem Tamek, Member of the Collective of the Saharawi human rights defenders and ex-political prisoner.

The South African Committee for Human Rights exposed, on the margin of the seminar, pictures of the Saharawi victims of the Moroccan repression showing people injured Saharawis savagely tortured, burned alive or assassinated. (SPS)

 **Note from taamarbuuta: The Moroccan government bans all news sites related to the ongoing struggle in the Western Sahara. 

Reposted from Sahara Presse Service, inaccessible in Morocco due to government censorship.

“Mr. Kofi Annan,

Secretary-General of the United Nations

New York

Bir Lehlou, 3 December 2006

Mr. Secretary-General,

On Sunday, 25 November 2006, a new tragedy occurred in the Atlantic coast of the Saharawi territories under Moroccan occupation where 50 Saharawi citizens were drowned when their three boats sank while they were trying to reach the Spanish coast.

25 Saharawis youngsters died in the beginning of October 2006 under similar circumstances, while there are 15 others who remain missing after they had disappeared under unknown circumstances to which we referred in our letter addressed to your Excellency on 25 June 2006.

Mr. Secretary-General,

All the information that we have received from the survivors and the families of the victims in addition to reports and testimonies gathered by independent human rights organisations point to the involvement of the Moroccan occupying forces in this horrendous operation, which comes within the context of a systematic policy aiming at eliminating the Saharawis and draining the occupied Western Sahara of its own inhabitants.

Since the illegal occupation of Western Sahara on 31 October 1975, the Moroccan colonial authorities have been engaged in a series of eradicationist policies involving assassination and forced deportation of Saharawis into Morocco in addition to genocidal practices, kidnapping and disappearance perpetrated against hundreds of Saharawi civilians.

Since 21 May 2005, the date of the beginning of the Saharawi peaceful resistance, the Saharawi cities have witnessed an overwhelming presence of Moroccan oppressive security forces including police, gendarmerie and the army that have been deployed solely to smother the Saharawi civilians and put their neighbourhoods under permanent siege.

The colonial authorities have been targeting the active young people and subjecting them to a myriad of terrorist practices including assassination, burning, killing in premeditated traffic accidents, kidnapping, unfair detention, severe torture, and disposing of victims in remote places. These have also been coupled with policies of starvation, impoverishment, forced unemployment and repeated intimidation against individuals and communities in order to force them not only to renounce their convictions but also to depart their country and families.

These gross violations, which have resulted from the denial of a fundamental right, namely the right of the Saharawi people to self-determination, are the same violations to which we have repeatedly drawn attention and which were reaffirmed by the Office of the Higher Commissioner for Human Rights following the visit of its mission to the Territory in May 2006.

Reliable information indicates that there are active and organised mafias funded by the Moroccan occupying authorities, which operate in the Saharawi occupied territories and on the coast in collaboration with Moroccan oppressive apparatus that provide them with all logistical assistance in order to drive those young people, victims of the persecution of that apparatus, to migrate clandestinely and risk their lives in unknown journey across the ocean.

Mr. Secretary-General,

The death of a large number of innocent Saharawis, particularly young people, within a short time and in a territory that is under the United Nations responsibility is utterly unacceptable. For that reason we call on you to intervene urgently to put an end to this tragedy.

The Frente POLISARIO calls for an urgent international inquiry into the involvement of the Moroccan occupying authorities in the death of those young people and the ethnic cleansing against the Saharawis as well as the policies aimed at draining Western Sahara of its inhabitants and driving them, under duress, to go somewhere else.

In view of these actions that are in contravention of international law and conventions, we renew our call for an immediate extension of the mandate of the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara so as to encompass the protection of the safety of the Saharawi population in the occupied territories and safeguarding their fundamental rights, whilst working to enable to the Saharawi people to exercise, without delay, their inalienable right to self-determination in accordance with the Charter and resolutions of the United Nations.

Please accept, Mr. Secretary-General, the assurances of my highest consideration.

Mohamed Abdelaziz,

Secretary-General of the Frente POLISARIO

RABAT (Reuters) - Morocco’s most popular satirist urged foreign artists attending the country’s biggest film festival to be aware of what he called the Muslim kingdom’s obsession with censorship.

Ahmed Snoussi, known as Bziz, is popular with millions of Moroccans, even though he said the state had excluded him from its radio and television stations, and theatres, since 1988. The government says he is not banned or censored.

“I’m telling the festival guests that the event they are attending is a fake setting that is unable to veil the real plight of freedom of thought, opinion and press in Morocco,” he told Reuters by telephone from the Marrakech Cinema Festival which opened on Friday.

“The only show the authorities are offering to me is about my own ban and exclusion. They are obsessed by censorship because they see threats coming from every place.”

Actors, producers and directors from Europe, Africa, Asia and the United States are attending the nine-day festival, part of a government drive to promote Morocco’s physical and cultural assets to foreign film-makers.

Bziz, which means buzzing wasp in Moroccan Arabic dialect, has been hugely popular in theatres and university campuses since the early 1980s with jokes about crackdowns on dissidents, vote-rigging and the royal monopoly on power and wealth.

Bziz performs at university camps and festivals, and other events organised by opposition leftist groups and civic associations. He also distributes records and CDs of his act.

Morocco is widely regarded as the most open Arab state but rights groups there complain there are restrictions on freedoms of speech and opinion.

“There is a contrast between the good image of Morocco abroad because of the state propaganda and the reality of freedoms on the ground which is not good,” said Abdeslam Abdellah, spokesman of the independent Moroccan Human Rights Association.

“We asked the government repeatedly to lift the ban on Bziz but he is still banned. That is an example of the gap between government talks about respect of rights and reality,” he told Reuters.

That last quote says it best.

Earlier this year, the Moroccan government began banning websites.  Livejournal, photo sites, other similar blogging sites; to protect the people against what other people could possibly be freely posting on those sites (of course the government missed the point and left open all sorts of other blogging sites such as this one).

Before that, and for as long as Moroccans have had newspapers, I’m sure, the government has been marking subjects as taboo for the magazines and papers of Morocco.  Of course, those such as Le Journal Hebdomodaire and Telquel regularly push the boundaries, unfortunately the boundary-pushing articles are usually about sex, a subject which is no longer titillating enough to be taboo, apparently.  Just two weeks ago, both magazines wrote about sexual dissatisfaction of married couples in the country - how…fascinating?

In 2003, the editor of Demain and Douman, a French- and an Arabic-language weekly, was cut off by his printer after a scandal wherein he “insulted the person of the king” - the cutoff was a harsh blow on top of the fact that he faced three to five years in prison for his crime.

So while sex is alright, and Le Journal Hebdomodaire published an article on the still-underground Moroccan hip hop scene this week and public figures like Hamidou Laanigri can be made fun of, the king is entirely taboo.  “The person of the king is inviolable and sacred,” according to article 23 of the Moroccan constitution (Reporters Without Borders).  He can be photographed on a jet-ski, but how he paid for that jet-ski and hundreds of other things?  Forbidden.

So now, the Marrakech Film Festival, held in the schizophrenic city of Marrakech where girls ride around on motorbikes and nightclubs are open 7/7, but the city eats, breathes, and sleeps by the sound of the muezzin will host hundreds of foreign film artists, bringing potentially millions of dollars…

And ROMAN POLANSKI is the head of jury.  Polanski is of course best known in the United States for fleeing the country in 1978 days before his sentencing for raping a 13-year-old girl was supposed to occur.  He is also known for being the widower of Sharon Tate, who was murdered along with her unborn child in 1969 by Charles Manson and his cult.  In 1989, the judge who had been in charge of Polanski’s case retired, stating that he couldn’t wait anymore for Polanski to return.

How interesting - one of the most controversial film figures in the United States (controversial by AMERICAN standards!) is now appearing in Marrakech.  I have two sets of words for this, of course - one is “good for him,” the other is as Bziz said: “be careful.”

He’s right.