Freedom of Expression
Freedom of the press is relatively good compared with most other North African and Middle Eastern countries, though many journalists are thought to practice self-censorship. Questioning the legitimacy of the monarchy is a taboo. The debate on political Islam is severely restricted and it is illegal to question the kingdom's "territorial integrity", i.e. the virtual annexation of the Western Sahara. In 2005 the well known Moroccan journalist Ali Lmrabet was "banned from practising journalism for 10 years" and fined 50,000 Dirhams (about 4,500 euros) for reporting about conflict in the Western Sahara, according to Reporters Without Borders. As of 2007 Lmrabet is still barred from working as a journalist.
With the appearance in the scene of a few independent francophone magazines, such as Tel Quel and Le Journal Hebdomadaire and their sister Arabic counterparts (i.e. Assahifa Al Ousbouia), government control over the media has moved somewhat from direct intervention to more subtle pressures, such as the use of law suits and libel cases.
On May 2, 2007 the New York City-based NGO Committee to Protect Journalists published their annual report on the "10 countries where press freedom has most deteriorated" where it has reported that Morocco has "back slided" in terms of press freedom in 2007 after "having been considered as a leader in its region". In the report, Morocco was considered, along with Tunisia, as the country which "sentences the most journalists to prison in the Arab world".
According to the 2009 Press Freedom Index, Reporters Without Borders has ranked Morocco 127 out of 175.
Read more about this topic: Human Rights In Morocco
Famous quotes containing the words freedom of expression, freedom and/or expression:
“In the life of the human spirit, words are action, much more so than many of us may realize who live in countries where freedom of expression is taken for granted. The leaders of totalitarian nations understand this very well. The proof is that words are precisely the action for which dissidents in those countries are being persecuted.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“It is only because a person has volitions of the second order that he is capable both of enjoying and of lacking freedom of the will.”
—Harry Gordon Frankfurt (b. 1929)
“Parents do not give up their children to strangers lightly. They wait in uncertain anticipation for an expression of awareness and interest in their children that is as genuine as their own. They are subject to ambivalent feelings of trust and competitiveness toward a teacher their child loves and to feelings of resentment and anger when their child suffers at her hands. They place high hopes in their children and struggle with themselves to cope with their children’s failures.”
—Dorothy H. Cohen (20th century)