After two weeks of his disappearance, the Moroccan authorities set up a farce to clarify the fate of Hamdi Etarfaoui, a young Saharawi of 36 years old.
Hamdi Etarfaoui, a civil servant, worked in the Bachouia (under prefecture) of the occupied city of El Aaiún, and has disappeared immediately after a dinner organized under the supervision of the prefecture of El Aaiún; the invited people and among them two Moroccan ministers and the governor of El Aaiún were allegedly poisoned (according to Moroccan official version).
Hamdi has spoken at this dinner and has accused the Moroccan ministers of corruption. This meeting has also been filmed by the local television.
Since that time the family of Hamdi Tarfaoui sought for their son but all their attempts were in vain. Last Tuesday, May 22, the family organized a sit-in in front of the Bachouia (where Hamdi was working) and demanded that the fate of Hamdi be clarified.
In the evening, the electricity was cut in the whole city of El Aaiún !
A day after that, Wednesday, May 23, the Moroccan authorities said that they discovered the corpse of Hamdi cut into pieces, and they said that the murder (a Moroccan man, who according to the official Moroccan version, had also murdered a Moroccan woman) had been apparently drinking with Hamdi, which is an attempt to discredit the reputation of the Saharawi.
But there are doubts about the official Moroccan version. According to Saharawi activists, the Moroccan intelligence services were following Hamdi Tarfoui conspicuously after an agriculture forum that took place in the Moroccan city of Meknes, and they said that Hamdi expressed his concern about the Moroccan repressive activities against the Saharawi.
After the dinner in El Aaiún, the DST (“Direction du Surveillance des Territoires” – Moroccan Intelligence) kidnapped Hamdi and accused him of being behind the poisoning of the invited people; yet the investigators killed him and tried to get rid of the body.
Hamdi ´s mother does not accept burying his body till an autopsy is done.
Also yesterday,Thursday, May 31, the Moroccan police have arrested a Saharawi citizen on a main street accusing him of being the person responsible for the pictures of the remains of Hamdi Tarfaoui; according to a video testimony, Mohamed Zait El Aamria, 26 years old, said he was strolling on a public street when a patrol stopped him and kidnapped him. He was subject of ill treatment and torture; he added that the patrol was headed by the so called Dariaa Mouloud and his assistant Mohamed Hasiouni alias Moustach and Abdel Ali Rachidi. He also said that they threatened him, that he might have the same fate of Hamdi Ertarfaoui.