Moroccan Authorities Halt Same-Sex Wedding Ceremony Near Marrakech

Thus, we can read that on the night of Saturday, February 16, two Moroccan men aged 24 and 26 held a wedding ceremony in a holiday resort near the ochre city, until the interruption of the Royal Gendarmerie.

In addition, the American media specifies: "The wedding, attended by Middle Eastern businessmen and other LGBTQ Moroccans, took place in a luxury tourist complex in Saada, a rural town near Marrakech."

According to Therebel, who takes up word for word the article written by Moroccoworldnews on February 21, the guests at this wedding were asked to turn off their phones to prevent the leakage of photos and videos of the wedding.

So new information in this case. The men who were going to get married were 24 and 26 years old and were both Moroccan, there were people from the Middle East acting as guests, and the people were cautious, the wedding was supposed to remain secret. No desire to use it for any ideological struggle.

Let’s remember that the residents of the neighborhood where this wedding was taking place gathered in front of the guest house to try to prevent it, that it was an employee of the guest house who alerted them of the place and time, that the owners of the guest house refused to stop the ceremony and that the residents alerted the authorities who proceeded to arrest at least 8 people, the others having fled the scene.

Both media, Moroccoworldnews and Therebel, do not fail to point out that "Same-sex marriage is illegal under Article 489 of the Moroccan Penal Code, which criminalizes "obscene or unnatural acts committed with an individual of the same sex." It is punishable by six months to three years’ imprisonment and a fine of 120 to 1,200 dirhams."