Morocco gets colonial documents and promises ‘cultural resistance spaces’

Morocco has announced that it has retrieved just under four million documents dating back to the French and Spanish colonial periods. It is believed that there are up to 20 million such documents held abroad, said the government in Rabat, which has been recovering them since 2008.

In the introductory memorandum for the draft of the budget bill for 2023, the government affirmed that it would continue the programme of retrieving the National Archives of the colonial era which was launched twelve years ago. The aim is to “preserve the historical memory and the glories of the national struggle and spread the values of patriotism.”

The government promised to contribute to building and installing “cultural resistance spaces”, establishing monuments and memorials, and preparing the cemeteries of the martyrs to introduce the symbols of national resistance against colonialism. Officials added that the government has published almost sixty books and magazines related to the history of Moroccan resistance.

The National Human Rights Council demanded in a memorandum sent through diplomatic channels that the French Diplomatic Archive of the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs should hand over the archive of Muhammad Bin Abd Al-Karim Al-Khattabi, who is regarded as the most prominent Moroccan resistance fighter. “The original documents of Al-Khattabi,” the council explained, “were seized by the French army in 1926, following the defeat of the Rif tribes led by Al-Khattabi.”

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