Moroccans flood streets of Rabat in solidarity with Rif

Thousands of people have taken to the streets of Rabat demanding that authorities release the leaders of a protest movement that has rocked Morocco's neglected northern Rif region for months.

The demonstrators marched along Mohamed VI avenue in downtown Rabat in a procession nearly a kilometer (less than a mile) long, chanting "Free the prisoners!", an AFP correspondent said.

An interior ministry source said between 12,000 and 15,000 people took part in Sunday's protest which was organized by several organizations including Morocco's most popular extremist group.

The tolerated but unrecognized al-Adl Wal Ihsane (Justice and Charity) organization put the number of demonstrators in what it hailed as "a historic march" at one million.

Over the past two weeks authorities in the North African country have arrested dozens of people in a crackdown on al-Hirak al-Shaabi or "Popular Movement" protests in the Rif port of al-Hoceima.

Eighty-six people have been referred to the prosecution, among them 30 who have been charged with offenses including "undermining internal security", and have been incarcerated.

Among them is al-Hirak leader Nasser Zefzafi, who was among the first to be arrested on May 29.

On Sunday, many marchers held up portraits of Zefzafi, and his father also briefly joined the protest alongside families of other arrested activists.

The demonstrators also waved the flags of the Amazigh, Morocco's Berber community.

The mainly Berber Rif region has been rocked by social unrest since the gruesome death of a fishmonger in al-Hoceima last October.

SS