Tragic Incident Sparks International Outcry and Calls for Accountability in Moroccan Water Sports Tragedy

Two Moroccan young men lost their lives on the evening of Tuesday, August 29, 2023, while practicing water sports on a Jet Ski. They had mistakenly entered Algerian waters at the Ben M’hidi port and were fired upon by Algerian coast guard personnel.

The deceased, identified as B.Q, who held Moroccan and French citizenship and was a father of two children, was taken to the regional hospital in Dziraq, near Oujda, with three gunshot wounds. He was buried in the Sidi Hazeem cemetery in the outskirts of Oujda after his body was found near Saidia by a fisherman. The second victim, A.M, who also received a gunshot wound and was swept away by the waves to the other side of the shore, remains in the custody of Algerian authorities, along with one of the other five young individuals, under questionable and arbitrary detention.

This incident represents a gross violation of international standards regarding the use of force by law enforcement officials, as established by the United Nations General Assembly’s Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials. Principle 9 of these Basic Principles states that firearms should only be used by law enforcement officers in self-defense or in defense of others against imminent threats of death or serious injury, to prevent the commission of a particularly serious crime involving a grave threat to life, and to apprehend a person who poses such a threat and resists their authority, or to prevent their escape when less extreme means are insufficient to achieve these objectives. In any case, intentional lethal use of firearms should only occur when there is no other option to protect lives

International standards also emphasize that law enforcement officers must identify themselves in such situations and provide clear warnings of their intent to use firearms, with sufficient time for individuals to heed those warnings, unless such actions would be clearly inappropriate and could result in law enforcement officers being exposed to danger or create risks of death or serious harm to others, or would be clearly futile in the circumstances

Furthermore, governments and law enforcement agencies must hold senior officials accountable if they were aware or should have been aware that law enforcement officers under their command were resorting to or had resorted to unlawful use of force or firearms, and they failed to take all measures in their power to prevent, stop, or report such use. Excuses of superior orders are not acceptable if law enforcement officers knew that an order to use force or firearms resulted in the unlawful killing or injury of a person and had a reasonable opportunity to refuse to obey it. In any case, responsibility also lies with superiors who issue unlawful orders

Given these distressing developments, which violate the sacred right to life and personal safety of Moroccan citizens, the Moroccan Forum for Democracy and Human Rights expresses its condemnation and denunciation of the racist and unlawful actions carried out by Algerian coast guard forces resulting in the deaths of Moroccan citizens

The Moroccan Forum for Democracy and Human Rights announces the following positions and decisions:

1. Condemnation and condemnation of the racist and unlawful behavior of Algerian coast guard forces in the killing of Moroccan citizens

2. The return of the second victim, whose body was washed ashore in Borsaï, Algeria, to the family of the deceased, who awaits this with all living and humanitarian consciences (the transfer of his body to Moroccan soil for burial)

3. A call to the United Nations Security Council, the United Nations, and its main bodies such as the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to open an investigation into the killing of Moroccan tourists and the imposition of penalties on the responsible leaders and all those involved in the unlawful killing and to hold them accountable

4. A demand for African mechanisms such as the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights to condemn the Algerian criminal act and hold the perpetrators accountable

5. The Moroccan Forum for Democracy and Human Rights is prepared to take all necessary steps to hold human rights violators accountable and those who acted outside the scope of the law, as well as perpetrators of crimes against humanity among the Algerian military personnel