French lawyer exposes baseless Pegasus accusations against Morocco

Morocco has been targeted with unfounded accusations of using Pegasus malware to spy on dissidents, said its French lawyer, adding that 18 months after these “imaginary” accusations were made, Amnesty or any of the accusers failed to show any hard evidence of wrongdoing.

These claims “have not been backed by any technical evidence,” Olivier Baratelli who defends Morocco in its French courts told a conference held by the Moroccan parliament.

Morocco had sued ten media outlets for parroting an Amnesty report accusing Morocco of using Israel’s NSO-made Pegasus to spy on different activists.

“None of the plaintiffs had been able to provide his phone or show evidence that he was infected by the malware,” he said on a video projected at the conference.

Circles hostile to Morocco and its growing influence have used Amnesty’s unfounded accusations in a smear and propaganda campaign to undermine Rabat’s interest in the EU and the European Parliament.

Experts at a Paris appeals court examined Amnesty’s report on the alleged use by Rabat of Pegasus but found no evidence of any infiltration of the so-called targeted people in France, he said.

In Spain, journalist Ignacio Cembrero accused Morocco of using Pegasus against him but his case was abandoned by a Spanish court after legal experts found no evidence on his phone.

“These false accusations were targeted at Morocco in order to undermine its international reputation,” by Cembrero, the lawyer said.

“What we are sure about in this case is that Morocco is exempt from any wrongdoing but meanwhile other European states are proven to have used the malware,” he said.