" There is no censorship at all in Morocco . I think that all attempts of banning and censoring site are retreating now. I am completely sure that blocking sites is a desperate attempt to hide the blue sky above."

Mohammad Al-Azhary, Moroccan citizen.

General Overview

The Moroccan Kingdom is suited in the far north west of the African continent. It has a close relationship with European countries particularly France which was the former colonial power .After winning independence in 1956 royalty returned to Morocco the first king was Mohammad V king, his grandson Mohammad VI came to power in 1999.

Initially Mohammad VI started some political reforms. He released thousands of detainees, gave a financial compensation to families whose bred winner had died in prison. He also allowed the opposition to practice its activities (1). During the last few the country has witnessed a huge development in the economic field especially in the communication field.

According to the latest statistics, Morocco 's population is over 31milion and the average annual income is 1381 dollars per capita (2).

Access to the Internet

There are 1.3 million fixed telephone lines and some 9.3 million mobile phone lines (3). The service has rapidly expanded in the last few years since just three years ago there were only 5 million mobile phone lines (4).

The "Morocco Communication” company dominates the communication market in Morocco where it has a monopoly over fixed line phones services in addition to offering mobile phone service. The company was fully government owned until 2000 when a resolution privatizing it was issued.

The market changed enormously in 2006 when the "Mid Tel" company won the license for the fixed phones service which means its has entered into service provision over which the Moroccan company had maintained a monopoly,(though there were a number of independent providers these were dominated by the parent company) (5).

The internet first entered Morocco in 1995. Initially there were few internet users. However this changed when Mohammed IV came to power. He declared his support for a new educational decade until 2008 in which all schools will become connect to the internet (6) . The main reason for the new found importance is in order to attract foreign investment. Current official statistics estimated there to be 1 million users and there are more than 10,000 websites registered in Morocco (7).

Experts believed that the communication market will witness further rapid development from the beginning of 2006. It is hoped that the price will be reduced after the monopoly is ended.

Bloggers in Morocco

An active presence on the internet is not restricted to efficient political groups exclusively and it is also widely used by individuals to record their personal views via blogs. Most of these are published in French, the language which prevails among Moroccan intellectuals. One of the records published news about a corruption case involving a senior employee in the General Economic Affaires Ministry. The blogger "Rashid Jankari" published documents and bills which brought about a wave of reactions. The whistle-blowing blogger was threatened with the sack but eventually the public outcry resulted in the dismissal of the high official. (8)

Blocking and Censorship

The reports of International human rights organizations and of specialists and experts in Morocco mentioned that internet enjoys freedom and independence unavailable in most other Arab countries. The state does not ban specific sites (9). It does not stipulated that it must have the information of those who apply for the service from the providing company. The citizens can browse any site in a full privacy (10).Carl Stanziek, the manager of a company which provides internet services added that there is no, what are called, "use contracts" between the provider and user of the service. Also the authority does not impose any liability on the providing company in cases where there is illegal content. (11).

Morocco is one of the most liberal countries with regard to the internet in Africa (12). This has meant that the internet is increasingly used by political forces in Morocco to get their messages to the public, particularly since the traditional media is unable to be used for this job. Thus for example, Abdel Alslam Yassen leader of the "Justice and Charity", association, a political Islamic organization, has published an open letter in numerous languages under title of "To whom it may concern" in which he criticized the era of King Hassan II. He talked openly about the distribution of the late king's wealth. It was published on the internet, as the regime banned an independent newspaper that had published it (13). The State Security department report said that Moroccan authorities had banned the site of Justice and Charity (14).

However, the blocking of the site is not permanent as the group has changed its web address many times. Currently one can access the site from inside Morocco (15). In addition to the groups official site on internet which is sometimes banned there are lot of forums and sites that sympathize with the group and also spread its ideas and news and these are not blocked (16).

Active political engagement via the internet continues to grow in Morocco . The Moroccan human right activist "Mahdi Mangara" who is prohibited from appearing in the traditional mass media had established a website. Also, he established the "Baraka Movement" which is similar to the Egyptian Kefaya Movement since its objective is to oppose despotism and the monopolization of power. (17)

The relative level of freedom to use internet does not mean that there are no red lines. The red lines in the traditional media and political life are well known and include topics such as disagreeing with royal statues in Morocco and the status of Western Sahara which the government considers as integral part of Morocco . Topics that offend the king or Islam are also taboo. These red lines are also applied to internet in shape of a self censorship by the users who do not cover such issues even on web forums (18) .

The independent Moroccan press has achieved a lot of freedom over the last few years. It could, for first time, criticize the royal position in Morocco and discuss Western Sahara . The Moroccan press group has welcomed the pledge of Nabiel Abd Allah from the Ministry of Communication in 2005 to put an end to the imprisonment of journalists took place under the Moroccan Press Law. However, to date the Ministry has not implemented the pledge (19).

Freedoms in general and of internet in particular were restricted by the anti-terror law of 2003 (20) which local and international human rights groups opposed. The law includes some articles that curtail the freedom of internet use. Other reports talked about using technical methods to block websites, these sources are sure, however, that such methods will be ineffective (21).

Cases involving the blocking of sites began to increase in 2005 when Reporters Without Borders issued a statement that condemned the Moroccan authorities for blocking many sites affiliated to Polisaro Front which seeks independence for Western Sahara .The statement considered the banning of sites without any judicial procedure as a scandalous violation of expression freedom (22). The report spotted banning five sites of the Polisaro Front including spsrasd.info and asro.org (23).

These sites were blocked using a technique to block IP address. It is a technique which blocks a great number of sites that have the same address of the site they want to block and as such is highly indiscriminate. Consequently the resolution of the Moroccan authorities led some 2287 different sites being blocked (24).

On 20 December 2005 the Moroccan authorities blocked the anonymizer site which is an American site that allows internet users to overcome the ban imposed on some sites by hiding who the user is (25). This used to help the internet users inside Morocco to overcome the original ban imposed on the Polisaro Front sites, which were banned during a media war between them and the Moroccan government after the Polisaro Front accused Morocco of blocking its sites. This prevented the inhabitants of Western Sahara from following the activity of the Front which was, until then, increasingly successful through its Arabic, French, English and Spanish sites in winning sympathy of wide spectrum of the public both Moroccan and international concerning their issue (26).

Despite the recent rescinding of some hard won rights for internet freedom, there is growing awareness of opposition positions and sites and Morocco remains, relatively, free in comparison with other Arab countries.

Internet Cafés

Internet cafés are an integral part of Moroccan citizens' dealing with internet this is largely because few Moroccan have computers sets or internet connections in their homes. Though the number of houses which are connected to the internet has increased, internet cafés are still the primary means through which the youth connect to the internet. (27)

The first net cafés appeared in "Fase" city inside the Sheraton hotel in 1998. Later cafés spread across all the large and small towns. The competition which arose from this led to a decrease in price to 4 to 6 per hour which in turn spured great growth in the sector (28). It is estimated that there are some 1500 internet cafés in Morocco (29).Though there are other estimates that put the number at more like 2500 (30).

Internet cafés help in reducing both poverty and illiteracy among the youth. It is estimated that some 5,000 people, mostly youth are employed by internet cafés many of these are university graduates and students.

There are no official restrictions on internet cafés. The law specifies that any person has the right to apply for an internet café license through the Agency. The process is no more complex than the normal process for any other commercial activity (31). However, if the café is detrimental to national or public security or it contradicts morality and customs, the Agency has the right to prevent offering the service within 2 months, starting from deposit date that is fixed by the submission date (32) and last for 1year. The license is renewed annually (33).

The different sources have asserted that internet cafés in Morocco guarantees full freedom for their clients. One citizen said that there are no restrictions in internet cafés and that the number of cafés is continually increasing, though most of the villages are deprived of this service as it is not available in isolated places (34). Another citizen says that he can freely brows all pages of internet even pornographic ones, despite the pressure of some religious authorities on the government to ban these sites (35). However, another citizen claimed that that the governor of the town in which he lives had called the internet café owners and warned them not to allow clients belonging to the banned group "Justice and Charity" to enter the cafés .

Human Rights Watch spotted one case of censorship as an owner asserted that he received a warning from the local police in February 1997 not to display or operate a geographical computer program called 3D Atlas .Though the reasons for this were not clarified, he understood that it contained information about the ‘Sahrawy Republic' (those who claim independence for Western Sahara) about which the government does not tolerate discussion (36).

Though the state has not officially taken measures to curtail web use inside internet cafés there are demands from popular and press groups for some restrictions. A press report on internet in Morocco concluded by saying, "there are no policies or initiatives to protect internet users from full openness to the world” (37).