ALGIERS —
Algeria gave prison time to
a journalist charged with “spreading false information” but released him as he
had already served his sentence, a rights group said Wednesday.
اضافة اعلان
Mohamed Mouloudj, of defunct daily newspaper Liberte, was handed
overnight into Wednesday a year in prison and another one-year suspended
sentence, according to the National Committee for the Liberation of Detainees
(CNLD).
As he had already spent more than 13 months in pre-trial detention, the
group said the court in the Algiers suburb of Dar El-Beida ordered his
immediate release.
Six other defendants in the same case who had been detained since
September 2021, were also released.
They were all acquitted of terrorism charges that had been brought
against them, said defense attorney Hakim Saheb.
The prosecution had initially sought a 10-year prison sentence for
Mouloudj and 12-15 years for the other defendants, the CNLD said.
Mouloudj was arrested on September 13, 2021 along with 15 others accused
of membership of the Movement for the Autonomy of Kabliye, a separatist group
that Algeria considers a “terrorist” organization.
They were apprehended in connection with an investigation into deadly
forest fires a month earlier in the northeastern Kabliye region, a stronghold
of the Amazigh (Berber) minority.
Former colleagues said the security service had questioned Mouloudj
several times before his arrest and confiscated his passport for a few months.
The Dar El-Beida court on Tuesday also ordered the release of human
rights activist El Hadi Lassouli after 16 months behind bars, the CNLD said.
Local media reported that Lassouli, co-founder of the CNLD, was acquitted
of charges relating to the financing of aid to detainees during the 2019 Hirak
protest movement.
Ten other people charged in the same case were all released, the group
said. Some of them were acquitted and the rest had completed a one-year prison
sentence.
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