Center to preserve Moroccan prisoners rights

The Moroccan Observatory of Prisons (OMP) announced Wednesday the creation of an Independent Center for Prisoners (CIPR) that will endeavor to "humanize Moroccan jails and preserve the right of inmates."

The Center, to be funded by the British embassy in Rabat, will follow up conditions prevailing in Moroccan detention centers and will receive complaints from the detainees and their families.

This initiative is meant to break the isolation of prisoners and enable the Observatory to oversee closely the situation in prisons, OMP's secretary general, Abderrahim Jamai said.

According to Youssef Meddad, deputy secretary general of OMP, the Observatory will provide the concerned persons with lawyers who examine eventual complaints and settle the problems to which prisoners are confronted.

OMP, he added, has started a program of seminars and workshops to train prison guards and employees in the penitentiary administration.

OMP, which aims at securing the rights of prisoners, had said in a report that the main problems in Moroccan jails are overcrowding, sexual deviations, drugs consumption and corruption.

This non-governmental independent association, set up in 1999 to monitor inmates rights to dignity and human treatment had also deplored poor quality of living conditions, meals and hygiene in prison kitchens.