Moroccan Agent Indicted in Germany for Spying on Hirak Activists

A Moroccan citizen has just been indicted in Germany for espionage. Arrested in Spain at the end of 2024, the suspect is accused of having collected information on behalf of the Moroccan intelligence services.
TEXTE:
The suspect, identified as Youssef El A., is precisely the one who is being prosecuted for having spied on supporters of the Hirak opposition movement, and this, over a period of three years. This is what the German Public Prosecutor’s Office detailed after the charges were formalized before a court in Düsseldorf.

It was in this context that Youssef El A. had been apprehended in Spain on December 1, 2024, under a European arrest warrant issued by the German judiciary. His transfer took place last January 15: he was escorted by plane from Spain to Frankfurt by two police officers, where members of the Federal Criminal Police Office were waiting for him to bring him before a federal investigating judge.

Once presented before this German magistrate, the latter immediately mentioned a "strong suspicion" that Youssef El A. had operated in Germany as an agent of the Directorate General of Studies and Documentation (DGED), the foreign intelligence service.