Morocco Accused of Destroying Spanish Republican Prisoners’ Graves, Sparking Outcry

The association was alerted by the inhabitants of the region that these tombs are being destroyed for the rehabilitation of the cemetery fence, said Óscar de Marco, one of the officials, to EFE. On this basis, the NGO denounced on its Twitter account this "destruction" of the tombs by the Moroccan authorities and asked the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory "to file a formal complaint and request their protection".

"We want you to ask Morocco what is happening. Cemeteries are places of memory," explains De Marco, who wants the remains to be repatriated to Spain if their protection cannot be ensured. According to a report from the Spanish consulate in December 1940, "about 4,000" Spanish Republicans were buried in this cemetery. They worked "in inhuman conditions" on the construction site of the Mediterranean-Niger railway, particularly the section from Bouarfa in Morocco to Colomb-Béchar (now Béchar) in Algeria.

The number of prisoners is estimated at around 2,000, according to some studies. According to a Red Cross report in July 1942, there would be 818 detainees in Bouarfa, including 694 Spaniards and 124 others of 16 nationalities or stateless persons. Several dozen of them died of epidemics, hunger or torture between 1940 and 1943, a period when Morocco was under French protectorate.