Backsliding

The two journalists from the weekly newspaper Al Watan Al An, Mustafa Hormatallah and publisher Abderrahim Ariri were convicted by a criminal court in Casablanca for "concealing items derived from a crime."

VOA News. The conviction of two journalists for apparently violating Morocco's version of the Official Secrets Act, is the kind of prosecution that before the Bush Administration would have been laughable in the United States. Ironically, it would appear that, with its support for secret detentions and torture, the Bush Administration's effect on press freedom and human rights in Morocco has been generally malign at a time when the Kingdom has become more liberal generally.