Chairperson of Association for Victims’ Rights Condemns ‘Exploitation’ of Her Statements by AFP

“It is in this context that I was contacted by AFP, in my capacity as President of an association dedicated to defend the rights of victims of rape and sexual assault, whose cases have been singularly avoided in the text of the EP resolution, having preferred, on the contrary, to take up the cause of the guilty,” Guellaa told MAP.

When AFP published the news story in question, she added, “I was surprised to see that my words were not only truncated, but also inserted just after an opinion attributed to the Moroccan authorities, to create without doubt, an amalgam between the AMDV and the public authorities and undermine the independence of this non-governmental association, that some try stubbornly to portray as an appendage of state institutions.”

“By seeking, in a pernicious way, to associate the AMDV’s positions with those of the Moroccan authorities, the AFP aspires, in reality, to reinforce the fallacious feeling that the cases of the victims of rapes and sexual aggressions were fabricated by the aforementioned authorities,” argued Guellaa.

In fact, she noted, “by asking for my opinion, which was knowingly emptied of its substance, the AFP intended to exploit it as a simulacrum of contradictory debate”, adding that “the arrangement of the contents of the news story was carried out in such a way that my words are made inaudible within a panoply of opinions supporting the EP resolution.”