(VRT) Each year on the feast of Eid al-Fitr that marks the end of Ramadan, the Moroccan King Mohammed VI grants pardons to some of those being held in the country’s prisons. This year Abdelkader Belliraj, a man with dual Moroccan/Belgian nationality, was among the 1,533 to be granted a pardon by Morocco’s head of state. 30 of those released were serving time for offences contacted to extremist ideology or terrorism.
Abdelkader Belliraj was given [his] sentence in Morocco for having led a terrorist network and for 6 murders committed in Belgium. In 2022 his sentence was reduced to 25 years.
In Belgium Abdelkader Belliraj was suspected of 6 politically-motivated murders committed in the 1980s. However, the statute of limitations for his case in Belgium passed in 2020 and as such he can no longer be prosecuted here for the murders allegedly committed 4 decades ago.
