Sports shirt ignites new crisis between Algeria and Morocco

As soon as Adidas announced on its official Twitter page the photos of the new set of jerseys for the Algerian national team, noting that its design is “inspired by history and culture” and “the ancient patterns of the Mechouart Palace” in the Algerian city of Tlemcen, until the Moroccan Ministry of Culture were quick to object strongly to the design, calling it “the cultural appropriation of a form of Moroccan heritage for use out of context”, as it was inspired by the traditional Moroccan mosaic pattern known as “Zellij”, emphasizing that it “would contribute to the loss and distortion of identity and history these cultural elements,” and promised to sue Adidas with his intention to sue. based in Germany to recall these sports shirts, accusing them of stealing Moroccan heritage. Conflict between the two countries flared up again, leaving a state of tension over intellectual property around many cultural heritage vocabularies; Where couscous, the caftan dress, the art of rai and gnaua music have previously caused conflict between the two countries, prompting UNESCO to declare couscous a Maghreb dish on the heritage list. , in December 2020, after filing a joint case. Between the countries of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Mauritania, there are still disputes about the identity of the “kaftan” costume and the origin of the “rai” music!