Rabat, Morocco - Increasing voices in Morocco want the country to demand damages from Spain for the use of chemical weapons during the 1920-26 Rif war, press reports said Thursday. Colonial powers Spain and France put down a rebellion in the northern mountainous Rif region, which was part of the Spanish protectorate at the time.
The National Rally of Independents (RNI), the second most important party in the coalition government, has called for damages over the use of chemical weapons in the conflict, following similar requests from non-governmental organizations.
"It is our right to demand compensation for the victims of the Spanish chemical war," parliament president Moustapha Mansouri, of the RNI, said.
"We have documents proving the horrors committed in the Rif," he explained.
Mansouri's call for damages was backed by media commentators, who said the government should take up the case, instead of a single party.
The Rif region, which is inhabited largely by the Amazigh, also known as Berbers, sought independence from both Spain and Morocco in the 1920s.
Rebel leader Mohammed Abd el-Krim proclaimed independence in 1921 and sought international recognition for a Rif republic.
The rebel movement inflicted heavy defeats to Spanish troops, prompting the colonial powers Spain and France to join forces to crush it.
Madrid used German-made chemical weapons which were prohibited by international treaties, according to several historians.
The Rif now has proportionately the highest number of cancer cases in Morocco, reports said.
The international context had evolved to the point where time was ripe for Morocco to seek damages, Mansouri said.
Spanish critics of such demands have pointed out that the Moroccan regime itself used napalm to quash an uprising in the Rif in the 1950s.
Mansouri took up the case of the Rif at a time when Morocco's relations with Spain had deteriorated over several issues, including the expulsion of a Spanish secret service agent for unclear reasons, analysts said.
The Amazigh were the original inhabitants of North Africa before the Arab conquest in the 7th century.
