Moroccan communications Minister and Moroccan government spokesman Khalid Naciri has announced that the Berber-language television channel will begin broadcasting in 2009.
Naciri stressed that the Berbers are an element of the Moroccan identity, and that the television channel will embody the social pluralism that has characterized Morocco throughout the ages.
Moroccan Treasury Minister Salaheddine Mezouar said that the new channel shows the fundamental change undergone by Moroccan society, and its openness to the Berber language.
Source: Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, London, December 14, 2008
A post on a web forum connected to Al-Qaeda urged Algerian jihadists to murder the Kabyle (Algerian Berber) singer Oulahlou.
The call was a response to an article in the Algerian daily El-Shorouq El-Yawmi, which reported that the singer's recent album "Love and Liberty" contained songs insulting to Islam.
According to the article, one of the songs said that the Islamic hijab should only be put on sheep, and another used terms associated with divinity to describe a romantic relationship.
The Arab liberal website Aafaq reports that due to the threats Oulahlou was forced to leave Algeria.
The Moroccan Amazigh (Berber) Democratic Party is protesting against the Moroccan government's ban on giving children Berber names such as Massinissa and Yugurtha.
The ban calls such names "foreign to Moroccan society."
Also, 16 Berber associations are planning to demonstrate on June 16 in Rabat against the holdup in the launch of the government Amazigh-language television channel – which is contrary to the 2006 resolution to requiring 30% of air time to be allocated to Amazigh-language programming.
The Movement for the Autonomy of Kabylia (MAK) announced it will hold a march in the city of Bejaia to commemorate the 28th anniversary of the Berber Spring.
The announcement stated: "This historic date marks Kabylia's split with the Algerian dictatorship, and represents its acknowledgment of its Berber identity… The [Berber Spring] events brought to world attention the ancestral values of Kabylia that represent freedom, democracy, human rights, and secularism."
A conference was held last week in Morocco on the Amazigh (Berber) identity and the future of democracy in the region.
Among those attending were advisor to King Mohammed VI, Morocco's House of Representatives chairman, and the head of the Royal Institute for Amazigh Culture in Morocco.
From Algeria were present representatives from the liberal Berber party Rally For Culture and Democracy (RCD), and Movement for the Autonomy of Kabylia (MAK) president Ferhat Mehenni.
The conference was hosted by the Moroccan Mouvement Populaire party.
Sources: El-Shorouq El-Yawmi, Algeria, March 25, 2008; Aujourd'hui le Maroc, Morocco, March 26, 2008
A court in the city of Ouzarzate in South Morocco has sentenced 10 Berber activists to between one and six years' imprisonment, on charges of illegal assembly, burning the national flag, obstructing traffic and assaulting a civil servant.
Supporters of the detainees claim that the 10 had participated in a peaceful demonstration in the town of Boulman n Dades calling for recognition of the Berber language in Morocco.
A petition for their release has been posted on the internet.
Source: Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, London, February 23, 2008; www.amazighworld.org, December 21, 2008.
On February 5, Algeria's Channel 3 aired a program on the spread of Christianity in the Kabylia region.
Kabylia is a Berber region east of the capital Algiers.
According to the program, which included interviews with converts to Christianity, some 20 Protestant churches were recently established in the region.
In response, Algerian Religious Affairs Minisgter Bouabdellah Ghlamallah stated that if no preventive measures were taken, there would soon be a Christian minority that would clash with society and demand its rights.
Source: El-Nahar, El-Shorouq El-Yawmi, Algeria, February 5, 2008
Amazigh (Berber) activists in the Rif region in northern Morocco are planning to announce the formation of a new Amazigh-Jewish friendship association next week, on February 14.
Opponents to the idea say it is a move for normalization with Israel.
Responding to critics, Amazigh Democratic Party president Ahmed Adghrini said that Morocco already has many contacts with Israel, but that some think that such contacts should be a government monopoly, adding, "We have broken through this blockade."
The association will be the second of its king; last year, a simlar body was formed in the Souss region in the south of the country.
Teachers of the Tamazight (Berber) language in Algiers are in the fourth day of a hunger strike to demand tenure.
Linguist Abdennour Abdesselam has accused the Algerian regime of trying to speed up the disappearance of the Tamazight language, and has threatened to appeal to UNESCO.
The hunger strikers have the support of teachers' unions, the Algerian League for the Defense of Human Rights (LADDH), and members of the political system and the civil society
Several strikers have been taken to hospital for medical treatment.
Source: La Depeche de Kabylie, Algeria, October 30 and 31, 2007
