Moroccan forces suppress peaceful protest in the city of El Ayun:
El Ayun / Western Sahara, August 9, 2010: The Moroccan police violently intervened Saturday against dozens of Saharawi demonstrators in the occupied city of Al Ayun, who peacefully chanted slogans calling for the self-determination in Western Sahara.
The Moroccan repressive forces also imposed a strong hold security blockade on the place of the demonstration with dozens of police cars flocking at the scene, and besieged the house of Sahrawi human rights activist, Hassan Dah, member of the sixth delegation that recently returned from a visit to the Saharawi refugee camps.
Saharawi militant Hayat Rguibi, member of the same delegation, was hijacked during the demonstration. She was released thanks to pressure from Saharawi masses which sat-in Sidi Mohamed Avenue in the occupied city of Al Ayun to demand her release.
She said in a statement that she was transferred outside the urban neighbourhood in the south of the city on board a Moroccan police vehicle, and severely beaten inside the vehicle, before being transferred to the headquarters of the Moroccan occupation security mandate, where she remained for approximately 45 minutes under torture and interrogation, blind-folded and handcuffed, focusing on relationship with the Polisario Front and recent visit by 10 Sahrawi human rights activists to Saharawi refugee camps.
On the other hand, Moroccan intelligence services imposed close surveillance on three Saharawi human rights activists Mr. Sidi Mohamed Dadash, chairman of Saharawi Committee for defence of self-determination for the Sahrawi people, Mr. Hmad Hammad, vice chairman the same committee and Mr. Yahdih Taruzi, a former Saharawi political prisoner and human rights activist, in addition to Spanish activist and observer Mr. Javier Sovina, in the Moroccan city of Ouarzazate, and they were stopped many times at the checkpoints since they left the occupied city of Al Ayun, on the ground of their visit to Saharawi human rights activist and former political prisoner Abbas Sbai, who recently released.
Source: (SPS)
