Army and Monarchy in Morocco: Rebellion,Allegiance and Reforms

The study of the complex relationship between army and monarchy in Morocco provides support for the argument that coup-proofing and institutionalisation enable civil leadership to enhance and maintain civilian control over the military. Through a strategy of coup-proofing implemented by the monarchy to protect itself from coups d’état, the army had been depoliticised. Through institutionalisation the Moroccan army is now governed by a clear set of constitutional and legal norms, principles and procedures with a system based on meritocracy. This approach is helping to stabilise relations between state and society and avoid power struggles between civilian leaders and the armed forces.     

Fatal poisoning by vanadium

We report here a fatal intoxication case involving ammonium vanadate. A 24-year-old woman was admitted to the Emergency Department for abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, multiple daily diarrheas, hypoglycaemia (0.2g/L) and severe acute renal failure with glomerular filtration rate estimated at 21 ml/min. This patient had taken an undetermined amount of ammonium vanadate 12h after ingesting. She died next morning in the context of respiratory distress despite intensive care and oxygen therapy. The autopsy revealed widespread asphyxia syndrome and erosive gastritis. Determination of vanadium concentration in blood was carried out by means of mass spectrometer (ICP-MS) using rhodium ((103)Rh) as the internal standard. The vanadium concentration was 6.22 mg/L, corresponding to 6000 times higher than normal concentration in the general population. The latency and the brutality of clinical picture degradation seem to be in consideration of systemic poisoning by vanadium leading to inhibition of the cellular respiratory process.