The Temara interrogation center, also known as Temara secret detention center ( ar, معتقل تمارة السري), is an extrajudicial detainment and secret prison facility of Morocco located within a forested area of

Rabat Rabat (, also , ; ar, الرِّبَاط, er-Ribât; ber, ⵕⵕⴱⴰⵟ, ṛṛbaṭ) is the capital city of Morocco and the country's seventh largest city with an urban population of approximately 580,000 (2014) and a metropolitan populati ...

, Morocco. It is operated by the

Directorate for the Surveillance of the Territory The General Directorate for Territorial Surveillance ( ar, المديرية العامة لمراقبة التراب الوطني, ''Mudīriyyat Murāqabat al-Turāb al-Waṭaniy''; ; , commonly referred to as the DGST or the DST), is the internal ...

(Direction de la surveillance du territoire, DST), a Moroccan domestic intelligence agency implicated in past and ongoing human rights violations, which continues to arrest, detain and interrogate individuals suspected of involvement in terrorism-related activities outside of the Moroccan legal framework.

History

The first known detainee was Mohammed Mossadegh Benkhadra ( ar, محمد مصدق بن خضراء), in 1985 and spent 8 years in extrajudicial detainment and without trial. And later when he was released 1993, he wrote the book "Tazmara 234", contraction from words Temara and

Tazmamart Tazmamart ( ar, سجن تازمامرت) was a secret prison in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco, holding political prisoners. The prison became a symbol of oppression in the political history of contemporary Morocco. It is located near the city of ...

another popular prison and as a sign of continued abuse from the Years of Lead (Morocco) to present days. More recently,

Zakaria Moumni Zakaria Moumni ( ar, زكرياء مومني ); born 4 February 1980 is a former kickboxer who was detained by the Moroccan authorities between September 2010 and February 2012. Torture incident According to Moumni he was arrested in September 201 ...

claimed to have been tortured there when he was arrested in 2010.

CIA black site

The Associated Press reported in August 2010 that, according to several current and former American officials, the US government possesses video and audio recordings of

Ramzi Binalshibh Ramzi Mohammed Abdullah bin al-Shibh ( ar, رمزي محمد عبدالله بن الشيبة; also transliterated as bin al-Shaibah; born 1 May 1972September 11, 2001 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial ...

being interrogated in a secret prison. The US officials told the AP that the prison was run by Moroccans but largely financed by the CIA, which in late 2002 handed Binalshibh over to Moroccan custody and kept him there for five months. The Moroccan government has never acknowledged the facility's existence, despite allegations by freed Guantanamo detainee Binyam Mohamed Temara interrogation centre and others that the CIA relied on Morocco as a secret proxy detention site during the period after September 11, 2001.

Torture of Detainees

Members of the DST are not considered to be part of the judicial police and as such should not arrest and hold suspects. Frequently reported methods of torture include beatings, the suspension of the body in contorted positions, and the threat of rape or other sexual abuse of the detainees. Other reported methods include rape by the forced insertion of objects such as bottles into the

anus The anus (Latin, 'ring' or 'circle') is an opening at the opposite end of an animal's digestive tract from the mouth. Its function is to control the expulsion of feces, the residual semi-solid waste that remains after food digestion, which, d ...

sleep deprivation Sleep deprivation, also known as sleep insufficiency or sleeplessness, is the condition of not having adequate duration and/or quality of sleep to support decent alertness, performance, and health. It can be either chronic or acute and may vary ...

cigarette burns Cigarette burns are usually deliberate injuries caused by pressing a lit cigarette to the skin. They are a common form of child abuse and torture Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for reasons suc ...

, and the application of live electrodes to the body. Several non-government organizations such as

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 ...

and Human Rights Watch have denounced reports of torture at the facility.

References

{{Human rights in Morocco Political history of Morocco History of Western Sahara Political repression Human rights abuses in Morocco Torture in Morocco Black sites Prisons in Morocco

History

CIA black site

Torture of Detainees

See also

References