Mr. Abderrahmane Youssoufi
Prime Minister
Kingdom of Morocco
Royal Palace - Le Mechouar
Rabat
Morocco

Dear Prime Minister,

I am writing to express my concern about abuses of children in Ceuta and Melilla described in the Human Rights Watch report, Nowhere to Turn: State Abuses of Unaccompanied Migrant Children by Spain and Morocco. The report documents cases of Moroccan children who were abused in Ceuta and Melilla and then summarily expelled to Morocco, where Moroccan police beat and ill-treated them. Instead of returning children to their families or a social welfare agency, Moroccan police detained even young children for hours—at times with unrelated adults—then released them on unfamiliar streets, sometimes late at night. The report also notes with concern provisions in Morocco’s Penal Code and Code of Criminal Procedures that criminalize vagrancy and begging, a lack of clear sentencing guidelines and adequate alternatives to incarceration, and a lack of appropriate facilities for children living outside a family environment or convicted of crimes.

I urge you to ensure that unaccompanied migrant children who have been returned to Morocco from Spain are protected from violence and neglect. The government should take steps to protect these children from torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment at the hands of Moroccan police, and to ensure that all children who have been deprived of a family environment, or in whose best interests cannot be allowed to remain in that environment, receive the special protection and assistance to which they are entitled, with attention given to the rehabilitation of children who are victims of neglect or abuse. Finally, I call on you to enforce the Compulsory Basic Education law and take all other steps necessary to ensure that poor children, girls, and rural children are not discriminated against in access to education.

I look forward to receiving your reply, and thank you for your attention to this important human rights matter.

Sincerely,