More than 380,000 people worldwide, including Ex-Muslims International, are urging King Mohammed VI to grant a royal pardon to Moroccan feminist and human rights defender Ibtissame Betty Lachgar in March, as her health continues to deteriorate in detention.
On March 8, International Women’s Day, coordinated actions will take place at
Moroccan embassies and consulates worldwide calling for her immediate
release and urgent medical care.
Betty has now been imprisoned for over six months. Following international protests in December, she was released from solitary confinement, but she continues to be denied a mattress and urgently needed specialised medical treatment.
Her medical condition has become critical. A bone cancer survivor, Betty lives with a prosthetic humerus in her left arm. That prosthetic has now failed and is fully detached at the elbow. She is in constant agony and requires specialised surgical intervention that had been scheduled in France prior to her arrest. Without urgent treatment, she faces severe infection, possible amputation, and life-threatening complications.
The global petition calling for Betty’s pardon is organised by Avaaz, a global civic movement with millions of members worldwide and a member of the Free Betty Coalition. The petition has now surpassed 380,000 signatures, and more than 40,000 people have sent personal messages of support to Betty through the Avaaz platform.
International pressure and recognition surrounding Betty’s case continue to expand. The Free Betty Coalition now includes more than 150 civil society organisations worldwide. Amnesty International has designated her a prisoner of conscience. Human Rights Watch has called for her immediate release, and her case has been raised before the United Nations Human Rights Council. It has been publicly announced that Betty will receive the 2026 Avijit Roy
Courage Award from the Freedom From Religion Foundation at its October
conference, recognising her defense of freedom of conscience.
A spokesperson for the Free Betty Coalition stated:
This is about Betty’s case but it is also something much larger. It is about the deliberate use of law as a weapon. About how a state can fabricate a crime out of an act of feminist resistance and put a 50 year old disabled woman behind bars for it. She is the first ever Moroccan feminist to be imprisoned for the very act of feminist activism. The international community cannot be indifferent.
Betty, a clinical psychologist and founder of MALI, the Movement for Individual
Liberties, has campaigned for LGBTQI+ rights, women’s rights, reproductive
freedoms and freedom of conscience in Morocco for more than 15 years.
In August 2025 she was arrested in Rabat and sentenced to two and a half years in prison after days of violent threats over a social media post in which she wore a T-shirt reading “Allah is Lesbian.” The shirt was worn outside Morocco in solidarity with two Iranian lesbian women sentenced to death. The phrase derives from a widely circulated feminist quote attributed to French feminist Anne-Marie Fauret.
On March 8, demonstrators will gather at Moroccan embassies and consulates carrying white paper doves representing freedom and wearing white arm slings marked FREEBETTY.ORG to symbolise her urgent medical crisis.
Coalition members, joined by more than 380,000 signatories worldwide, are calling on King Mohammed VI to grant a royal pardon in March and ensure Morocco upholds its international human rights obligations. Betty’s case represents both a freedom of expression crisis and an escalating humanitarian emergency. Her health continues to deteriorate. The international community is watching.
For more information, to sign the petition, or to take action, visit
FREEBETTY.ORG.