MOROCCO. COURT SENTENCES TWO BOMB SUSPECTS TO DEATH

a court handed death sentences to two Moroccans arrested in 2005 on suspicion of helping organise suicide attacks in 2003 that killed 45 people in Casablanca, lawyers said.
Youssef Addad and Abdelmalek Bouizakarne were found guilty of threatening lives, possession of explosives and forming a criminal band with the aim of preparing terrorist acts. Thirteen others were handed prison sentences ranging from five to 30 years. Relatives wept when the verdicts were read out at the court in Sale near the capital Rabat. The government said the Casablanca suicide bombings were carried out by disaffected youths from grindingly poor neighbourhoods on the fringes of the city who had been brainwashed by Islamic extremists. According to the authorities, Addad was the head of a radical Islamist group named As-sirat Almoustakim (The Straight Path). But his defence lawyer, Mohamed Ben Sahraoui, said the sentences were unfair.
"There is no proof from the courts of their guilt," Sahraoui said. "If they have explosives they must be produced ... The court didn't even ask for witnesses." He said the defendants' statements had been extracted from them by force.