French don broke Ben Barka's neck, says agent
By Brian Love
PARIS: A former counter-espionage agent has broken decades of silence to
describe the Paris kidnapping and ``accidental'' killing of Moroccan
dissident Mehdi Ben Barka in the the 1960s.
Antoine lopez, a 76-year-old French ex-secret service agent sentenced to
eight years in jail in 1967 for his own role in the affair, denied a recent
report that the Leftist's body was buried under a mosque very near Paris.
The fate of Ben Barka, maths tutor to the late King Hassan II before his
rise as a revolutionary and flight into exile in the early years of Moroccan
independence, has remained a mystery ever since, shrouded in state secrecy.
In an interview with Le Parisien newspaper, Lopez spoke of the involvement
of the Moroccan interior minister of the time, General Mohammed Oufkir, and
a kidnapping which took a fatal turn when a French underworld figure broke
Ben Barka's neck.
Lopez recounts how he and several others lured Ben Barka into a car outside
the brasserie Lipp Cafe on the fashionable Boulevard Saint-Germain in Paris
on October 29, 1965.
According to the Lopez version of events, Ben Barka died at the hands of
French gangster Georges Boucheseiche while holed up at a house south of
Paris, pending the arrival of an envoy sent by Hassan II.
Oufkir and Moroccan police chief Ahmed Dlimi arrived a day after the
kidnapping at the house where Ben Barka was being held by several French
underworld figures, including Boucheseiche, Lopez said.
``Ben Barka was supposed to meet an emmisary of the King of morocco, Hassan
II, and discuss the terms of his return (to Morocco),'' Lopez said. ``That's
as much as I knew.'' Lopez, who is preparing to publish a book 25 years
after an event which rocked the French political establishment during the
rule of President General De Gaulle, said he had left with his family for
the weekend, leaving Ben Barka with his accomplices. On hearing a radio
bulletin reporting the kidnap, Lopez said he rushed back to Paris.
``At 5 a m on Sunday morning, Oufkir woke me up. He seemed extremely
bothered. He told me Ben Barka was dead, that it was an accident, that this
was a `veritable catastrophe','' he says. ``I couldn't possibly imagine the
consequences, he (Oufkir) told me ... I asked Oufkir `What do we do now
General?'. His reply was, `Stay quiet. If you have to, tell the King (Hassan
II) it was an accident','' Lopez recounted.
He then told of a trip with Oufkir and others in a car and several stops at
sites near Paris, and that one of the sites, under a viaduct near
Courcouronnes, south of Paris, was where he assumed Ben Barka's body had
been dumped.
``Boucheseiche joined us at Orly (airport area) that Sunday morning, where
he had to catch a flight to Morocco as soon as possible,'' Lopez said. ``He
(Boucheseiche) told me how Ben Barka had flown into a rage when he set eyes
on Oufkir,'' Lopez said, going on to spell out the way in which Ben Barka
had died.
``He (Boucheseiche) delivered a first blow to Ben Barka, who was not even
knocked out. Boucheseiche than jammed him by the throat and snapped his
neck,'' he said. Lopez said he was now telling the story because he wanted
to come clean after so many years sworn to silence, years in which many of
the others involved had died or disappeared.
Oufkir, the second most powerful man in Morocco at the time, died in the
early 1970s after a failed coup attempt against King Hassan II. His death
was declared to have been suicide. Police chief Dlimi, who was tried but not
convicted in the wake of Ben Barka's demise, died in a car accident and the
fate of several others, including Boucheseiche, is unknown.
Following Hassan II's death last year, Ben Barka's family has been allowed
to return to Morocco and investigations into Mehdi Ben Barka's death have
been revived. France decided in January to lift the lid of state secrecy on
some of the documents relating to the mystery at the request of a Paris
investigating magistrate who has also asked Rabat to renew cooperation in
his inquiries into Ben Barka's death. (Reuters)
For reprint rights: Times Syndication Service
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