World is burning

Educated Moroccans protest unemployment, law graduate who set himself alight dies from burns

27-year-old Zeidoun set himself on fire in Rabat last week during protest by unemployed university graduates.

CASABLANCA (Morocco) - One of two young Moroccans who set himself on fire in Rabat last week during a protest by unemployed university graduates died of his wounds on Tuesday, a hospital source said.

The two men set themselves alight near an education ministry building on January 18, the latest in a string of self-immolations across the region since the Arab Spring started more than a year ago.

"Abdelwahab Zeidoun died at around 5:00 am (0500 GMT)," a doctor at Casablanca's Ibn Rochd hospital said on condition of anonymity.

The 27-year-old, who held a master's degree from the University of Fez, was among a group of five who doused themselves with petrol during a sit-in protest and tried to set themselves alight.

The fire only caught on two of them, who were then transferred to Casablanca, 80 kilometres (50 miles) south of the capital along the coast.

"We're in a state of shock and we don't yet know what we're going to do. For the time being, we're carrying on with our sit-in," a student named Asma who was the spokeswoman of the group said.

Asma said that after Zeidoun's death was announced, dozens of youths headed for Casablanca to gather in front of the Ibn Rochd hospital.

The sequence was caught on video and has been posted on social networking websites. In it baton-wielding police can be seen trying to prevent food supplies being delivered to the sit-in protestors.

Thousands of Moroccans with university degrees and seeking jobs in the civil service have been demonstrating almost daily to voice their frustration at the lack of employment prospects.

In the north African country of 33 million people, the unemployment rate is officially reported to be 9.6 percent, but 31.4 percent of people aged under 34 are affected.

Prime Minister Abdelilah Benkirane, whose Islamist party won November polls called early by the king to pre-empt swelling Arab Spring-inspired protests, has vowed his new government will address their grievances.

In a speech to parliament last Thursday, Benkirane outlined a five-year plan for economic growth and said the government would reduce unemployment to eight percent.

The Arab Spring started in December 2010 when Mohamed Bouazizi, a young fruit seller in the unemployment-stricken Tunisian town of Sizi Bouzid, self-immolated to protest against police harassment and the lack of opportunities.

His sacrifice triggered unprecedented protests that eventually toppled president Zine el Abidine Ben Ali a month later and spread to other countries, also felling long-standing despots in Egypt, Libya and Yemen.

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