Mahdi Ben Barka was one of the well-known opposition activists and intellectuals in Morocco in the 1950s and 1960s and became a symbol for opponents of the royal house and the world left after being abducted, tortured and murdered in Paris in 1965. But now , And even did so for follow money.
Details revealed in the British Guardian indicate that the charismatic intellectual was paid for information from Czechoslovakia's secret service, and even traveled to Iraq on a pilgrimage for the organization after the country's new government was formed in 1963. Moreover, the documents raise the possibility that even Salmon received American intelligence CIA, which at the time sought to bring about liberal reforms in Moroccan government.
"Ben Barka is often portrayed as a freedom fighter against colonialist interests and for Third World countries, but the documents revealed reveal a very different picture. ", Says Dr. Jan Kaora, a research fellow at Charles University in Prague.
A sign in memory of Mehdi Ben Barca in Paris,
"There is no doubt about the allegations that emerge from the screens. All the evidence is there," says the Czech academic, who went through more than 1,5000 confidential documents from the Cold War period. "Ben Barka has never admitted that he cooperated with the Czechoslovak intelligence and security services. Maul did not register him as an agent, but as a 'confidential contact.' But the fact is that he passed on information and received a lot of money," Kaora adds. "This is a smart and sophisticated man who has never signed anything on his behalf, there is no example of his handwriting in the documents," he adds, portraying the opposition man as a man who understood the conduct of intelligence services.
This sheds a completely new light on the case of the abduction and murder of Ben Barka, in which it was alleged that the organization of the Israeli Mossad, which in those years was in close relations with the Moroccan security services, also participated.
Ben Barca's family vehemently denies any connection to any intelligence organizations and in many left-wing circles, particularly in France and North Africa, the leader is considered a hero who sacrificed his life for the sake of anti-colonial ideology.
While Ben Barka's family members claim that his ties with the "Bloc of Socialist States" were made out of goodwill and a burning ideology, the Czech scholars exposed to his documents claim that the figure that emerges from them is much more complex.
"I'm not Mashi Sao condemning him, the Cold War was a complicated situation and should not be treated in terms of black and white," Kaora tells the Guardian.
Were we wrong?
Fixed!
If you found an error in the article, we'll be happy for you to share it with us