Morocco jails drug baron

2008-03-20 15:28

Rabat - A Moroccan drug baron was jailed along with the former head of Tangier's judicial police after a lengthy trial that pitted the Rabat authorities against powerful interests in the kingdom's northern cannabis growing region.

A Casablanca court jailed Mohamed Kharraz, better known as Cherif Bin Louidane, for eight years, the government said on Thursday. It ordered $712 600 of his fortune to be seized and fined him 500 000 dirhams.

Judicial police officers grabbed Kharraz in August 2006 at the Al Ghouroub (Sunset) cafe near the northern port city of Tangier, acting on a warrant issued after a separate drugs trial years earlier, newspapers said.

The arrest surprised locals for whom Kharraz had seemed virtually immune from the law and benefited from a reputation for generosity among the poor of a region neglected for decades by the central government, the papers said.

Two man jailed for drugs

He named more than 30 members of the security services as being implicated in the drugs trade including Abdelaziz Izzou, head of the Tangier judicial police from 1996 to 2003, who was suspended from his job as head of security at Morocco's royal palaces.

Izzou was imprisoned for 18 months and had 700 000 dirhams seized by the state. Two others were jailed including Kharraz's brother while nine people were acquitted including another top former Tangier police official, said the government.

Those imprisoned were found guilty of offences including international drug-trafficking, abuse of power, incitement to illegal immigration and failing to report crimes.

Morocco had aimed to erase its cannabis industry by this year, a campaign given added momentum by suspicions that hashish was used to partly pay for dynamite that blew up trains in Madrid in 2004, killing 191 people.

But the North African country was still the world's biggest hashish producer.

Smugglers 'hide drugs in trucks'

The dark green fern-like plant grows well in poor soil of the northern Rif mountains and had come to be known as "green gold" because it staved off grinding poverty for thousands of local families.

Smugglers hid the drug in containers and trucks or use powerful speedboats to ship it to Barcelona in Spain or Marseille in France.

Moroccan customs said drugs with a value of 30 million dirhams were seized at the port of Tetouan near Tangier last year, up six times from a year earlier.

But catching the top criminals and keeping them behind bars was still proving difficult.

Last year, drug lord Mohamed El Ouazzani, known as El Nene, was allowed to stroll out of prison and probably fled to Spain to avoid serving the rest of an eight-year prison sentence. Six prison guards were jailed for allowing him to escape.

- Reuters