(AI translated) Mohamed Bouial is a Sahrawi human rights activist and is considered one of the Sahrawi political prisoners associated with the events at the Aqdim Azizik camp. He was arrested in the aftermath of the dismantling of the camp in November 2010. Currently, he is serving a 30-year prison sentence and is detained at the local Ait Melloul prison in Morocco, far away from his family, which resides in the occupied city of Laayoune in Western Sahara.

This political prisoner was born on April 13, 1970, in Laayoune, Western Sahara. He is married and has two sons. One of his key roles within the Aqdim Azizik camp was that of coordinator of the camp’s dialogue committee, which played a role in facilitating communication and dialogue during the protest period—a role that later contributed to his arrest.

On November 8, 2010, Mohamed Bouial was arrested within the Aqdim Azizik camp, in the context of the events following the intervention of Moroccan occupation forces to dismantle the camp. His arrest was specifically linked to his role as coordinator of the dialogue committee. Since then, he has gone through a lengthy process of arrest and trial, which resulted in a 30-year prison sentence.

During his imprisonment, he suffered physical and psychological torture, especially in the period preceding his trial. He also claims that the documents used in his trial were signed under torture, pressure, and coercion, and that he was not allowed to read their contents before signing them. These claims raise serious concerns regarding the respect for his basic rights during his detention and investigation, particularly with regard to the absolute prohibition of torture and the inadmissibility of confessions or statements obtained under torture as evidence in court.

Over the years of his imprisonment, the Sahrawi political prisoner Mohamed Bouial conducted several hunger strikes to protest his conditions of detention and to demand respect for his rights as a prisoner. These strikes took place in 2011, 2013, and 2017, as part of his peaceful protests to demand improvements in his detention conditions and the respect of his rights. For him, hunger strikes were a means of protesting his situation in prison and expressing his demands while continuing to be detained.

During his imprisonment in various Moroccan prisons, including Sla 1 and Sla 2, Arjat 1, the Central Prison of Kenitra, and Tiflet 2, before being transferred to the current Ait Melloul prison, these frequent transfers, along with the length of his detention, have exacerbated the suffering of both him and his family, especially since they live in the occupied city of Laayoune in Western Sahara.

At the judicial level, Ahmed Salem was tried by the Rabat Military Court on February 13, 2013, and then retried by the Rabat Appeal Court on July 17, 2017. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison. Given the claims of torture and pressure during the investigation period, the circumstances of these trials warrant documentation and further legal scrutiny, particularly with regard to whether the trials met the basic guarantees of a fair trial.