Aug 4
Many people in Morocco credit King Mohammed with ending repression and ushering in democracy in the North African kingdom, but some politicians say the rise of a new party with links to the palace could put those reforms at risk.
Here is a timeline on Morocco since King Mohammed came to the throne:
July 23, 1999 - Morocco's King Hassan II dies from a heart attack and his son Mohammed VI ascends the throne.
Nov. 30, 2001 - The king leads Friday prayers in Smara, the spiritual capital of Western Sahara, to help cement ties to the disputed desert territory. Morocco has controlled the former Spanish colony since 1976 despite opposition from the Algerian-backed pro-independence Polisario Front.
May 16, 2003 - Suicide bombers set off at least five blasts in Casablanca. Forty-five people are killed including 13 of the bombers and about 60 are wounded.
October 2003 - King Mohammed says he will reform women's rights, raising the minimum age to marry to 18 from 15, giving women property rights in marriage and allowing them to divorce their husbands.
July 2004 - Free trade agreement with the United States comes into effect.
April 2005 - A judge bans Moroccan satirist Ali Lmrabet from journalism for 10 years. Lmrabet, a strong critic of the monarchy, questioned the government's line on the status of refugees in Western Sahara.
Oct. 2005 - Hundreds of migrants attempt to surge across razor-wire fences around the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla, the only European Union territories in mainland Africa. At least 11 migrants die trying to scale the fences.
Dec. 16, 2005 - The Arab world's first truth commission says about 592 Moroccans were killed at the hands of the government between the 1960s and 1990s, a period known as "the years of lead". Victims and their families are compensated but none of the killers is named or punished.
March, April 2007 - Islamist radical Abdelfattah Raydi blows himself up in a Casablanca internet cafe to avoid arrest. A month later, police raid a safe house in a neighbourhood of Morocco's largest city. Three men, including one of Raydi's brothers, detonate explosive belts, killing themselves and a police officer and wounding more than 20.
Sept. 7, 2007 - In parliamentary elections, Abbas El Fassi's conservative Istiqlal party wins the most seats and he is named prime minister on Sept. 19, replacing Driss Jettou.
Nov. 6, 2007 - King Mohammed criticises Spanish King Juan Carlos's visit to the disputed enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla, saying it hurt the feelings of the Moroccan people and might imperil bilateral ties.
Sept. 6, 2008 - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrives in Morocco as part of a North African tour. Discusses anti-terrorism measures, political reform and urges a resolution to the Western Sahara dispute.
March 6, 2009 - Morocco says it has cut diplomatic links with Iran, after an outcry in the Sunni Muslim world over a statement by an Iranian official questioning Sunni-ruled Bahrain's sovereignty.
June 13, 2009 - A new Moroccan political party grouping King Mohammed's staunchest supporters wins most seats in local elections after pushing opposition Islamists to the sidelines.
(Reuters)
