HM King Mohammed VI has appointed Charki Draiss as new chief of National Security (Direction Générale de la sûreté nationale, DGSN) replacing General Hamidou Laanigri who will take over the position of General Inspector of the Auxiliary Forces with the task of supervising the Southern and Northern zones.
Laanigri, 63, became the second top general to lose his position after the government last month broke up Jihadist Islamist group Ansar el Mehdi (Mehdi Partisans), which recruited at least nine members of the police and the military.
Charki Draiss is a 51-year-old political affairs specialist and former governor in Laayoune, Western Sahara's main city, ( since June 2005) as Wali (super governor) of the southern region of Laayoune-Boujdour-Sakia Lhamra.
Army General Mohamed Belbachir, the military intelligence service chief, was fired last month because of what official sources said was his failure to prevent radical Islamists from infiltrating the military.
Belbachir was replaced by army Colonel Mohamed Maaiche, who has the task of rebuilding the military intelligence organisation from scratch as the body was dismantled when his former chief was sacked, the sources added.
The appointment of Draiss as the chief of the police, officially known as the National Security General Directorate (DGSN), came also as part of a drive to name civilians to head key security services and sideline the influence of the military in security matters, official sources and diplomats said.
Laanigri led the domestic intelligence service Territory Security Directorate (DST) until he was appointed DGSN police chief shortly after 2003 suicide bombings in Casablanca in which 45 people were killed.
DST is now headed by a 39-year-old civilian and anti-terrorism expert Abdellatif Hammouchi and foreign intelligence service, Documentation and Studies General Directorate (DGED), is also led by a civilian, Yassine Mansouri, who had replaced last year army general Ahmed Harchi.
Tags: Morocco Fes, Maghreb news
2 comments:
I am stunned that the General was replaced. He was a fixture in the security landscape here. Perhaps a sign that things are really changing?
Laanigri was a pompous, posturing blowhard concerned primarily with trying to demonstrate his superiority. Militant Islam was growing right under his nose while he was more interested in making sure his nose hairs were properly trimmed. Serves him right and Morocco will be better off for the change.
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