Rif Protest Activists Flee Morocco, Reach Spain by Boat

Jamal Mona, Abdelali Houd, Mourad Ouarahou, Wail Asrihi and Mouhsen Atari, Mohamed el Jaouhari and a young man named Benaissa are the seven activists who set sail. They all served sentences for participating in the Rif protests, according to the EFE agency. One of them was wanted by the police for a new trial that could have sent him back to prison.

According to some sources close to their families, the persons concerned chose to leave Morocco to escape police persecution and possible legal proceedings.

The boat that transported them spent nearly 24 hours in the waters before being assisted by a maritime rescue boat, the agency reports, specifying that in addition to these two boats, four others, also from the Rif, were intercepted in the last 48 hours by maritime rescue services in the waters south of Granada, with a total of 36 people on board, including two women and seven minors.

According to an independent study, at least 1,766 people from the Rif region arrived illegally on the southern coasts of Spain in the second half of 2020. Frontex data announce that 17,057 migrants arrived in Spain by the "Mediterranean" route, including 3,566 Moroccans. The Red Cross, for its part, counted 1,789 migrants in Motril (southern Spain), about half of whom were Moroccans.