Morocco has filed a lawsuit against a Spanish journalist who claimed Rabat put Israeli Pegasus spyware on his phone as per judicial sources.

A spokesperson for the regional court authority said that the complaint against Ignacio Cembrero, a specialist on Spain-Morocco ties who works for the news website El Confidencial, was approved by a court in Madrid.

It is worth noting that Morocco was accused of deploying Israeli-made malware, which infiltrates mobile phones to extract data or to turn on a camera or microphone to spy on their owners, in an investigation conducted by 17 media outlets last year. Rabat has refuted the charges.

In accordance with a copy of the complaint obtained by AFP, Morocco is requesting that Cembrero retract his claims and bear the expense of Morocco's legal representation.

"The Kingdom of Morocco is not involved in spying on Ignacio Cembrero nor on any other citizen" and "does not have the Pegasus programme," the lawyer representing Rabat said.  

Additionally, Cembrero had announced the case on his Twitter page.

He tweeted, on Monday, that "Morocco is taking me to court for accusing it of spying with Pegasus."

He claimed that this was "the fourth time" that Morocco had sued him in Spain, but it was the first time that he had been asked to "retract" statements that Rabat was behind the use of Pegasus software for espionage.

"It's a political trial to curtail journalists' freedom of expression," he tweeted. 

Read more: Morocco likely involved in Pegasus hacking 200+ Spanish mobile numbers

A look back 

Almost a year now, the world continues to react to the Pegasus spyware scandal as press reports continue to reveal how it aimed to target powerful and prominent figures, including politicians, journalists, and activists.

Why should we know about the Pegasus Scandal?

Pegasus is Israeli spyware that targeted prominent and influential figures all around the globe, including politicians and journalists.

The Israeli NSO Group-developed spyware leaks stated that there are more than 50,000 records of phone numbers that NSO clients selected for surveillance since 2016.

Through the leaked data and the investigations carried out by Forbidden Stories and its media partners, the NGO and its partners were able to identify potential NSO clients in 11 countries: Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Hungary, India, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Morocco, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Togo, and the United Arab Emirates.

This scandal prompted international and human rights organizations, news agencies, the European Union, and governments from all over the world to condemn the findings of the investigations.

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