(translation by Frances Webber)
It all started on 8 July 2013, when I received my post. One of the envelopes contained photos and a Brussels 20km medal, which a ribbon of my colours, the Belgian flag colours. A few hours later, the director ordered confiscation of the envelope and its contents.
This happened when I signed the register, as usual when I receive cards. Isn’t it an abuse, a provocation? I’m still waiting for the return of my envelope, the medal with the colours of my flag, for which I performed my military service in 1993-4. This is evidence of racism, vengeance on the part of the director and his confidant Bouazza
10 July 2013, these two came into my cell, while I was in the courtyard, at 11.30. The other prisoners saw them going in without asking for me to be there.
To provoke me, they pulled down postcards which I had stuck on a wall of the cell. They trampled on them, and they took away my personal cards. When I returned to my cell, they searched it, leaving everything upside down. I believe they took pleasure in doing it, with hatred, racism and evil in their hearts, in order to humiliate me – particularly Bouazza. As for the director, Abdellah Darif, he showed no humanity or intelligence when with his assistant Bouazza.
I asked to see him. He received me. I asked for an explanation. He said he was the director and I was just a prisoner. I just wanted to remind him that my rights had been violated by this sort of conduct. He warned me, threatened me that he would make my life impossible, and that Bouazza was the man in whom he placed all his confidence.
I returned to my cell and asked an officer if I could make a phone call. He said he had orders from the director not to allow me to make calls, or to go out to the courtyard, or to shower, or to receive personal mail. Now, I’m locked up in this prison with no rights to anything. I am locked in.
All because I told the director that he had no right to come into my cell, with Bouazza, in my absence. He was furious when I named and recalled his assistant, he threw me out of his office. He knows very well that he made a mistake in taking notice of Bouazza. The two together violated my rights.
Now, I ask myself if I have the same rights as any other prisoner. There are those who give all their money to get what they want in prison – and the two divide the booty between them.
Today, I decided to go on indefinite hunger strike until they give me back my rights, my personal possessions and the medal with the colours of my flag.
‘Anger and hatred make men blind. The first for an hour, the second, for life!’
Ali Aarrass
