This is the epilogue of a long legal soap opera between Paris and Brussels. Moroccan imam Hassan Iquioussen was deported to Morocco on Friday January 13 from Belgium, where he was arrested at the end of September.
This preacher from the north of France, whose interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, had announced the expulsion, at the end of July, for “speech inciting hatred and discrimination”was taken to Casablanca after being issued a laissez-passer by the Moroccan authorities on Thursday, said his lawyer, Lucie Simon.
Nicole de Moor, Belgian Secretary of State for Asylum and Migration, welcomed the “good cooperation” with France on this case, confirming the return of the person concerned to Morocco. “We cannot allow an extremist to roam our territory. Anyone who does not have the right to be here must be sent back”commented Mme the Moorquoted in a press release.
“Gérald Darmanin was very involved with his counterparts on this subject. It is a great victory against separatism”for his part commented on the entourage of the French Minister of the Interior.
At the end of July, Gérald Darmanin announced the expulsion of Mr. Iquioussen, accusing him “a proselytizing speech interspersed with remarks inciting hatred and discrimination and carrying a vision of Islam contrary to the values of the Republic”. But the imam could not be found when the expulsion order had been definitively validated by the Council of State on August 31. He had fled to French-speaking Belgium where he was arrested in the Mons region on September 30.
Waiting for a judgment from the Administrative Court of Paris
France wanted Belgium to hand over this 58-year-old Moroccan preacher “file S”, to send him back to Morocco. But Belgian justice refused in October to hand over the imam to the French authorities who was then placed in a closed center near Liège in mid-November for illegal stay, subject to an order to leave Belgian territory after the failure of the European arrest warrant procedure launched by France.
His French lawyer Lucie Simon was surprised Friday evening by the attitude of Morocco, which had refused last summer to France the consular pass allowing the removal of the imam in his country of origin. “I am surprised by the volte-face of the Moroccan authorities and I believe that Mr. Iquioussen’s life is in France”she reacted, stressing that the lawyers were not informed of the issuance of the consular document. “We are awaiting the judgment on the merits of the Paris administrative court, if the expulsion order [français] was cancelled, France will have to ensure its return.she added.
Disavowing the administrative court of Paris, which had urgently suspended the expulsion of the imam at the beginning of August, the Council of State had considered at the end of August that this decision to send him back to Morocco did not constitute “a serious and manifestly illegal violation of [sa] private and family life “.
Born in France, Mr. Iquioussen had decided when he came of age not to opt for French nationality. He claims to have given it up at the age of 17 under the influence of his father and then tried in vain to recover it. He has five children and fifteen grandchildren, all French.
In a new deportation order issued in mid-December, the Belgian immigration services observed that in the event of deportation from Belgium to be sent back to Morocco, there was no« obstacles insurmontables » maintaining the imam’s relationship with his family. This document recalled that his wife has a right of residence in France allowing her to go back and forth to Morocco.