Morocco Prosecutor Seeks Death Penalty for Imlil Tourist Killers, Breaking 30-Year Moratorium

The Public Prosecutor has again demanded the death penalty "with effective execution" against the three Moroccans. It should be noted that in Morocco, the death penalty has not been carried out since 1993.

This moratorium has been reinforced by a new article in the Moroccan constitution since 2011. It stipulates that "the right to life is the primary right of every human being. The law protects this right."

However, we remember the barbarism of which Louisa Vesterager Jespersen, a 24-year-old Danish student, and her friend, Maren Ueland, a 28-year-old Norwegian, were victims in December 2018.

Indeed, while they were camping on an isolated site in the mountains of the High Atlas, the two tourists were coldly killed, beheaded by three Moroccans who, during their trial, admitted to having acted in the name of the Islamic State (IS) group.

A total of 24 defendants are being tried since the end of August by the Court of Appeal of Salé, near the Court of First Instance of Rabat, in this case. The 20 other defendants, sentenced to five to twenty years in prison last July for "forming a gang with a view to committing terrorist acts", have had their sentences confirmed.

As for the victims’ families, they are demanding substantial compensation from the Moroccan state, which, according to them, will be used to set up a "foundation to fight extremism".