Arts and literature from the continent: the latest and some classics

Recordings from online literature festival Bila Hudood: Arabic Literature Everywhere are freely available, including a panel on African narratives in Arabic publishing. Access here

 

P21 Gallery’s online exhibition Soundtrack to Puzzled Identities is available until 31 July. Access here

 

The latest issue of The Common focuses on stories and art from Morocco. Access here

 

With Ousmane Sembène’s Mandabi back in cinemas in the UK in its 2019 remastered version, the BFI has a handy reminder of where to find some of the greatest films of the past decades from across the African continent. Read more here

Moroccan intelligence services and the Pegasus spyware scandal

The Moroccan intelligence services are one of the clients who has been making extensive use of NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware, as revealed by Forbidden Stories’s investigation. Pegasus has been used to track political opponents and supposed allies’ communications, including in this case the Moroccan king, Mohammed VI, Moroccan journalists, French President Emmanuel Macron, French ambassadors, and hundreds of Algerian ministers and political figures. More here  and here.
The Moroccan government denies any involvement and has threatened to sue Forbidden Stories for libel. More here.
While the extent and reach of intelligence services’ use of Pegasus was not known until the release of Forbidden Stories’ investigation, a report by Citizen Lab (University of Toronto) in 2018 already sounded the alarm over the surveillance of journalists and activists in Algeria, Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, Kenya, Libya, Morocco, Rwanda, South Africa, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda and Zambia. Read more here, with the original report available here.