Solidarity swells in Morocco after crackdown on free expression
Moroccan journalist Omar Radi has been released pending trial in March, but other YouTubers, rappers and students remain in jail for criticizing the king and the regime.
Omar Radi was in good spirits, mostly.
The Moroccan journalist had just been let out of a Casablanca jail on New Year’s Eve, five days after being arrested for criticizing a judge on Twitter. His freedom was uncertain pending a second trial in March, but the flood of public support for him and other political prisoners made things lighter.
A week later, sitting in a packed press conference alongside human rights defenders and lawyers, he lambasted the Moroccan regime for imprisoning citizens for expressing themselves.
After the press left, he hung around with friends, chatting and laughing. Radi, an affable 33-year-old, has eager eyes and a gentle face that scrunches up when he laughs. “I’m hopeful for my trial — I don’t think I’m going back to jail,” he told Al-Monitor. “But I don’t know. We’ll see how things evolve.”
