''Le Desk'' () is an independent Moroccan digital news outlet that publishes in French and Arabic. It was founded in 2014-2015 by

Ali Amar ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib ( ar, عَلِيّ بْن أَبِي طَالِب; 600 – 661 CE) was the last of four Rightly Guided Caliphs to rule Islam (r. 656 – 661) immediately after the death of Muhammad, and he was the first Shia Imam. ...

as well as two other co-founders, Fatima-Zahra Lqadiri and Aziz Aouadi. Its headquarters are in the

Mers Sultan Mers Sultan ( ar, مرس السلطان) is an arrondissement of Casablanca, in the Al Fida - Mers Sultan district of the Casablanca-Settat region of Morocco. As of 2004 it had 145,928 inhabitants. Education ''Groupe Scolaire Louis Massignon'', a ...

neighborhood of

Casablanca Casablanca, also known in Arabic as Dar al-Bayda ( ar, الدَّار الْبَيْضَاء, al-Dār al-Bayḍāʾ, ; ber, ⴹⴹⴰⵕⵍⴱⵉⴹⴰ, ḍḍaṛlbiḍa, : "White House") is the largest city in Morocco and the country's econom ...

History

Ali Amar established ''Le Desk'' after having created '' La Vie Éco'', which he says paved the way for independent media in Morocco. In 2015, ''Le Desk'' worked with the media NGO

Reporters Without Borders Reporters Without Borders (RWB; french: Reporters sans frontières; RSF) is an international non-profit and non-governmental organization with the stated aim of safeguarding the right to freedom of information. It describes its advocacy as found ...

to create the Media Ownership Monitor, a database identifying major players in Morocco's media landscape and their interests outside the media. It was the first time the Moroccan media landscape was scrutinized in this way. In 2018, ''Le Desk'' revealed that the lobbyist

Richard Smotkin Richard is a male given name. It originates, via Old French, from Old Frankish and is a compound of the words descending from Proto-Germanic ''*rīk-'' 'ruler, leader, king' and ''*hardu-'' 'strong, brave, hardy', and it therefore means 'stron ...

, who was later hired by the Moroccan government, played a role in the visit of Scott Pruitt, head of the US Environmental Protection Agency (2017-2018), to Morocco. The investigative journalist

Omar Radi Omar Radi ( ar, عمر الراضي) is a Moroccan investigative journalist and human rights activist. He has worked at Lakome, Atlantic Radio, Media 24, '' TelQuel'' and ''Le Desk'' and volunteered for the citizen media Mamfakinch, focusin ...

was working for Le Desk when he was arrested for a tweet and when

Amnesty International Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says it has more than ten million members and sup ...

discovered NSO Group's

Pegasus Pegasus ( grc-gre, Πήγασος, Pḗgasos; la, Pegasus, Pegasos) is one of the best known creatures in Greek mythology. He is a winged divine stallion usually depicted as pure white in color. He was sired by Poseidon, in his role as hor ...

spyware on his personal cellphone. ''Le Desk'' is affiliated with Mediapart as well as the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, which has been recognized for its work on the

Panama Papers The Panama Papers ( es, Papeles de Panamá) are 11.5 million leaked documents (or 2.6 terabytes of data) that were published beginning on April 3, 2016. The papers detail financial and attorney–client information for more than 214,488 ...

References

{{Reflist Digital mass media companies Moroccan news websites