Nominations for candidates in the country’s first-ever presidential elections closed on 22 November. With less than a month to go until the first round of voting, the political...

The Parti de la Justice et du Développement (PJD) members of former Prime Minister Saad Eddine el Othmani's government suffered a string of policy humiliations as ministers aligned...

The Muslim Brotherhood affiliate Ennahda dominated the decade after the fall of President Zine el Abidine Ben Ali, but in successive governments it failed to revive the...

Algeria's 'Deep State' has never gone away. Popular unrest decided le pouvoir (the powers-that-be) in favour of overseeing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's removal and throwing his kleptocratic clan to...

Having failed to become master of his country by the bullet with the collapse last year of his 14-month offensive against Tripoli, eastern-based General Khalifa Haftar has opted...

It has become the battle of the demonstrations. So far President Kaïs Saïed, who has suspended the constitution indefinitely, is winning but scepticism about his plans is growing.

When King Mohammed VI (M6) asked billionaire businessman Aziz Akhannouch to form a government, their meeting on 10 September formalised the victory of secular over Islamist factions in...

Officially, the Libyan civil war is over, the country has a single government of national unity (GNU) and a three-man Presidency Council (PC). Almost all of its previously...

The break in relations with Morocco, announced by Algeria's urbane Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra, on 24 August confirmed the continuation of their cold war – stoked by simmering...

Stunned by President Kaïs Saïed's decision to suspend parliament and govern by decree, the major political parties, led by the moderate Islamist party Ennahda, are left playing the...

The recent media reports suggesting Moroccan security services were using the Pegasus spyware by Israel's NSO – possibly with the financial support of the United Arab Emirates –...

President Kaïs Saïed's decision to sack his prime minister, Hichem Mechichi, after the massive anti-government protests on Republic Day (25 July) took few by surprise. They had been...

Rabat's 'encouragement' last month for a wave of migrants who, freed of Moroccan policing, promptly descended on the Spanish-ruled enclave of Ceuta, blew Saharan sands to a most...

While Algeria's establishment seeks new legitimacy from Assemblée populaire nationale elections set for 12 June, opponents are coming under a wave of suppression and elite faction-fighting continues. Coming...

Libya's new Government of National Unity (GNU), sworn into office on 15 March, is now widely accepted, despite accusations of vote-buying at the UN-organised Libyan Political Dialogue Forum...

The political map in Libya has dramatically changed in the past few weeks. For the first time in over six years, the country has a single administration –...

President Joe Biden has been in no rush to engage with the Egyptian authorities nor with other Middle Eastern leaders who had gained Donald Trump's favour. This is...

Returning in February from another bout of Covid treatment in Germany, President Abdelmadjid Tebboune has sought to gain momentum before opposition El Hirak (The Movement) and factional rivals...

Fresh from being elevated to the Legion of Merit by Donald Trump for his 'Abraham Accords' policy of normalisation with Israel, King Mohammed VI has reason to be...

Ten years from the start of the revolution that overthrew the Moammar el Gadaffi regime and six-and-a-half years after Libya split in two and civil war began, a...

There were plenty of fireworks on 14 January, the tenth anniversary of the 2011 revolution. Not, however, in celebration of the event. In suburbs of the capital and...

Libya now has a shortlist of 21 candidates for the post of prime minister and 24 for the three vacancies on the Presidency Council (one president and two...

Not all Moroccans were delighted when one of Donald Trump's very last actions as United States president was to award a rare Legion of Merit, Degree Chief Commander,...

Egypt's government will talk up its economy in 2021, trumpeting the opening of a vast museum in Giza housing Tutankhamun's skeleton and death mask, and the transfer of...

Only one thing is in Libya's diary for 2021: presidential and parliamentary elections on 24 December, the 70th anniversary of the country's independence in 1951. All 75 local...

There were glimmers of hope when a civilian president with a reformist reputation, Abdelmadjid Tebboune, was elected after mass protests ended his strongman predecessor's 20-year rule in December...

The Palace seems to be managing social tensions arising from the economic fallout of Covid-19 and coping with the widespread distaste for the kingdom's restoration of diplomatic relations...