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To address violations of international due process guarantees
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Amend the Criminal Procedure Code to include all the
internationally recognized due process guarantees; adopt legislation to shorten
the maximum duration of garde à vue (pre-arraignment) detention from the
twelve-day maximum allowed under the 2003 counter-terror legislation. The legislation
should conform to the U.N. Human Rights Committee's determination that a
suspect must be brought before a judge or other officer authorized to exercise
judicial power within a few days. The legislation
should give detainees the right to a lawyer when they are first questioned by
the police, and ensure that police inform them both of that right and of the
right to remain silent; those who cannot afford a lawyer should have the right
to a court-appointed attorney; enforce compliance with the legal duration of
garde à vue detention; and to ensure judges investigate when there is evidence
police may have entered a false date of arrest into their registry.
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Amend the Criminal Procedure Code to require that investigative
judges and trial judges grant defendants greater opportunities to produce
exculpatory witnesses before the court and to cross-examine witnesses for the
prosecution.
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Permit all defendants convicted under the Code of Criminal
Procedure before October 2003, at a time when defendants had no right to appeal
their convictions on factual grounds, to exercise such a right of appeal.
To end torture and other forms of ill-treatment
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Adopt legislation consistent with the recommendation of the U.N.
Committee against Torture that include[s] a definition of torture which is
fully consistent with the provisions of articles 1 and 4 of the Convention.
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Ensure that all allegations of torture and ill-treatment,
including the use of coercion, threats and intimidation, be promptly and
independently investigated, and if credible evidence is found against law
enforcement officers, to bring them to justice.
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Ensure that detainees are immediately informed of their right to
a medical examination, and that they can effectively and promptly exercise that
right.
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Enforce Article 293 of the amended Criminal Procedure Code, which
ensures the inadmissibility of any confessions made under violence or duress,
and implement the U.N. Committee against Torture recommendation to incorporate
a provision prohibiting any statement obtained under torture from being invoked
as evidence in any proceedings.
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Withdraw all reservations that Morocco entered when ratifying the
Convention against Torture, and make the necessary declarations provided for in
Articles 21 and 22 of the Convention, so as to recognize the competence of the
U.N. Committee against Torture (CAT) to make confidential investigations, and
to consider individual complaints.
To prevent secret detentions
- Hold all detainees only in officially recognized places of
detention, and cease all secret detentions, even if they take place on the
premises of an officially recognized detention facility; amend Article 67
of the Criminal Procedure Code to ensure that authorities promptly convey
to the family accurate information about a detainee's whereabouts and
legal status, and provide them with prompt access to the detainee.
- Ensure that detainees are taken into custody only on the
basis of an arrest warrant issued by a judge (except where genuinely
detained in flagrante delicto).
- Allow immediate and unfettered access to Temara detention
center to both national and international nongovernmental human rights
organizations.
To enhance the effectiveness of the Equity and Reconciliation Commission
- Declare that officials who obstruct or fail to cooperate
with the commission will face penalties.
- Declare that while the commissions mandate prevents it
from identifying individual perpetrators, it should turn over to Moroccos judiciary investigative materials that will help the courts fulfill their duty to
bring to justice perpetrators of grave abuses.
- Declare that no amnesty or statute of limitations will
apply to those implicated in acts of disappearance or other grievous
abuses of human rights; and that any case of enforced disappearance that
the commission does not fully clarify by the conclusion of its mission
will remain the subject of a continuing investigation for as long as the
victims fate is not clarified.
- Disclose publicly the extent to which it is receiving the
necessary cooperation of past and present officials in its investigations,
cooperation measured in terms of the provision of oral testimony,
documents, including medical-legal records and existing court files, and
other items of evidence; the commission should also disclose the impact of
any non-cooperation on the commissions task of providing a full and
truthful account of the period under its consideration.
- Publicly reaffirm the need for criminal accountability for
grave abuses, even if the commission itself is prevented from naming
individual perpetrators.
- Urge that any disappearances not successfully elucidated
by the commission should remain the subject of ongoing investigation until
the fate of the missing person is fully clarified, and that no amnesty or
statute of limitations should apply to those implicated in
disappearances or other grievous human rights abuses.
- Ensure that the commission or another state body provides
equal consideration to all forms of grave abuse of human rights
and not just arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance in terms of
what the commission provides to victims in the way of compensation,
assistance and all other measures.
- In light of the contested nature of events in the Western Sahara, the tighter security conditions in that region, and the large number of
cases emanating from there, ensure that the commission gives equal
consideration in its deliberations to Western Saharan victims of human
rights abuse and to the Western Saharan population generally.
- Make full use of the commissions mandate to propose
safeguards to prevent a recurrence of past abuses by underscoring that
serious, and in some ways similar, abuses are occurring today; recommend
concrete measures to end commonplace abuses of the rights of suspects in
police custody and the acquiescence in those violations by a judiciary
that fails to exercise its constitutionally guaranteed independence.
To the Special Rapporteur on Torture
- Request an invitation to visit Morocco to conduct an
investigation of reports and allegations of torture and other mistreatment
of detainees.
To the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention
- Request an invitation to visit Morocco and to conduct an
investigation of reports and allegations of illegal and arbitrary
detention of Moroccan detainees.
To the United Nations Security Council Counter-Terrorism Committee (CTC)
- Request that in its next report to the CTC, Morocco include information on counter-terrorism measures taken following the May 2003 attacks in Casablanca.
- Based on the review of the new and previous reports by
Morocco, identify areas of concern, in particular vis-à-vis Moroccos
compliance with the provision of Security Council Resolution 1456 requiring
that counter-terrorism measures adopted by states comply with
international human rights and humanitarian law. Request more information
as warranted.
- Establish a long-term plan with Morocco for developing
mechanisms for combating terrorism while protecting human rights.
To the U.S. Government
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In all communications from all agencies of the U.S. government to the government of Morocco, send a clear and consistent message that respect for
human rights must be integral to any security policy, including counter-terrorism
operations.
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Take all necessary measures to ensure that U.S. counter-terrorism assistance to Morocco is not used to violate human rights.
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Raise with the government of Morocco in all official meetings
concerns over the treatment of suspects arrests in the context of the
counter-terror campaign, and insure that any security policy and
counter-terrorism cooperation conform to international human rights standards.
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Assist the Moroccan government with reforming the criminal
justice system and with training programs for police, prosecutors and judges
that include emphasis on the protection of due process rights of all detainees.
This assistance should be conditioned on Moroccan authorities demonstrating
the political will to carry through the reforms and make judicial independence
a reality.
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Do not extradite or arrange the rendition to Morocco of persons
suspected of security or terrorist offenses unless and until the government
provides verifiable guarantees that such persons will not be subject to torture
or other ill-treatment in detention and interrogation; take steps to verify
that suspects already returned to Morocco have not been subject to torture or
ill-treatment.
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In all communications from all agencies of the European Union and
its member states to the government of Morocco, send a clear and consistent
message that respect for human rights must be integral to any security policy,
including counter-terrorism operations.
- Raise with the government of Morocco in all official
meetings concerns over the treatment of suspects arrested in the context
of the counter-terror campaign, and insure that any security policy and
counter-terrorism cooperation conform to international human rights
standards.
- Assist the Moroccan government with reforming the criminal
justice system and with training programs for police, prosecutors and
judges that include emphasis on the protection of due process rights of
all detainees. This assistance should be conditioned on Moroccan
authorities demonstrating the political will to carry through the reforms
and to make judicial independence a reality.
- Do not extradite or arrange the rendition to Morocco of
persons suspected of security or terrorist offenses unless and until the
government provides verifiable guarantees that such persons will not be
subject to torture or other ill-treatment in detention and interrogation;
take steps to verify that suspects already returned to Morocco have not
been subject to torture or ill-treatment.
- Call upon the Moroccan government to respect and comply
fully with the principles and obligations laid down in under Articles 7,8
and 13(a) of the Arab Charter on Human Rights (1994), which specify the
right to presumption of innocence, the right to freedom from arbitrary
arrest and detention, and the prohibition of torture or cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment.
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