Former Moroccan minister and lawyer Mohamed Ziane is currently detained on the basis of two distinct criminal cases, with one sentence completed and the second still under review by the Court of Cassation. Moroccan authorities frame his continued imprisonment as a straightforward application of criminal procedure, while human rights organizations consider the prosecutions politically driven and the detention arbitrary under international standards.
Mohamed Ziane, a former minister of human rights and ex‑head of the Rabat Bar, became an outspoken critic of Moroccan state institutions, especially the security services, and this visibility set the stage for the first criminal case against him. That case involved 11 charges including insulting public officials and institutions, defamation, contempt of judicial decisions, and morality‑related offenses, all of which he denied.
The Rabat Court of Appeal sentenced him in absentia to three years in prison, a verdict later upheld through the ordinary appeal channels, and he was arrested on 21 November 2022 to begin serving this term. According to the King’s General Prosecutor in Rabat, that first three‑year sentence ran from 21 November 2022 and was deemed completed on 21 November 2025.
Second case and current legal basis for detention
While he was serving the first sentence, prosecutors opened a second, unrelated case involving alleged embezzlement and misappropriation of public funds linked to his political activities. An investigating judge at the Rabat Court of Appeal ordered his pre‑trial detention on 10 January 2024, and the financial criminal chamber later handed down a three‑year prison sentence, which the appeals court confirmed on 7 May 2025.
Ziane’s lawyers then filed a cassation appeal against this second conviction before Morocco’s highest court, contesting both the substance of the charges and procedural aspects of the proceedings. Under Moroccan criminal procedure, as interpreted by the public prosecutor, a defendant in custody whose conviction has been upheld on appeal remains detained while a cassation challenge is pending.
Sentence-merger request and procedural posture
Acknowledging that two separate grounds for detention now exist, Ziane’s defense team submitted a request on 4 November 2025 asking the competent court to merge the two sentences into a single term. That request was heard on 12 November 2025 and, at the defense’s request, adjourned to a further hearing on 26 November 2025, with no final ruling yet issued at the time of the latest public statements.
As a result, Moroccan prosecutors argue that after 21 November 2025 his imprisonment is no longer tied to the first, completed sentence but to the second case, which is still active before the Court of Cassation. They maintain that this makes his continued detention “entirely legal” under domestic law and reject accusations of arbitrary imprisonment.
Human rights concerns and international scrutiny
Amnesty International, Alkarama, and other human rights organizations argue that several of the original 11 charges in the first case criminalize his expression and political commentary, and therefore violate his rights to free speech and fair trial. They also question the accumulation of overlapping charges, the way detention orders were issued and notified, and the decision to keep an elderly, high‑profile lawyer in continuous custody.
International media and NGOs frame Ziane’s case within a broader pattern of pressure on dissenting voices in Morocco, noting that authorities insist the prosecutions concern ordinary criminal offenses unrelated to his criticism of the state. For now, his fate depends largely on two pending decisions: whether the Court of Appeal allows any merger of sentences, and how the Court of Cassation rules on his second conviction.
