First Independent Mena Newspaper
The UN Secretary General’s Personal Envoy for the Sahara, Horst Kohler, invited the “parties to the conflict” to “separate talks” in Berlin, Moroccan media reported. The invitation was addressed after Kohler’s ten-day tour in Europe and Africa to relaunch talks, said le360.ma. According to the news portal, Morocco, the Algerian-backed Polisario and Mauritania are the […]
Despite the verbal attacks by Algerian senior officials on Rabat lately, Morocco’s Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita has attended the Western Mediterranean Forum, 5+5, where he delivered an address on neighborliness as a lever for stability. The Moroccan Foreign Minister’s attendance was subject of much speculations in the Algerian press with commentators going as far as […]
Algerian authorities are alarmed by the rising bill of refined products, which hit $2.5 billion in 2017 up from 800 million in 2016 due to a surge in domestic demand and lack of national refining industry. As Algeria feels the heat of an economic and financial crisis propelled by the oil price plunge, the country […]
A German court has sentenced an Algerian man to a year and nine months in prison for supporting the Islamic State group and for attempting to recruit and smuggle a would-be jihadist fighter to terror hotbeds in Syria. The Berlin district court said it convicted the 32-year-old, identified only as Fayssal M.B., for supporting a […]
Civil society associations in Guinea, Gabon and Niger have urged the African Union to put the issue of the human rights violations by Algerian authorities against Sub-Saharan migrants on the agenda as Algiers continues arbitrary expulsions of would-be migrants who are often abandoned in the desert on the borders with Niger. At a time the […]
Human Rights Watch has denounced the systematic violations of freedom of speech, assembly & association despite constitutional amendments guaranteeing these rights. Algerian authorities continued to resort in 2017 to criminal prosecutions for peaceful speech. They have also continued to ban demonstrations in Algiers, says HRW in its report 2018. The document says Algerian authorities routinely […]
President Alpha Condé has recalled Guinea’s Ambassador in Algiers in protest over the inhuman treatment endured by Sub-Saharan migrants in Algeria. The decision by Condé, who is also Chairman of the African Union, will draw attention to the double speak of Algeria, which aspires to have a voice in Africa while mistreating Africans on its […]
Morocco is set to be a major player within the African Union by integrating its supreme decision making body on peace and security issues: the Peace and Security Council (PSC). Morocco’s ambition to be member of the most important body within the African Union was expressed by Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita during talks recently in […]
Morocco has been described as one of the few safest countries in the globe for travelers by the US travel advisory issued by the US Department, while Algeria has been included in tier 2 danger requiring “increased precaution” due to the threat of terrorism. The contrast reflects the security gap in the Maghreb between oil-rich […]
Battered by a sharp decline in its international reserves, Algeria made of tourism a key sector to relieve its economy from an acute dependency on oil revenues. However, little is done to boost the contribution of tourism in GDP, which remains limited to 1.4% in 2016 with most tourists being Algerian expatriates returning to visit […]