Italy's embassy in Morocco has congratulated the North African country on the parliamentary and local polls held this week, in which Islamist parties suffered a crushing defeat by liberal forces.
"Sincere congratulations to Morocco for its great democratic exercise on 8/9 Sept. Good luck in your mandate to those who were elected, and every best wish for success in the spirit of partnership and fraternal friendship between our peoples," the embassy tweeted on Friday.
Morocco’s liberal RNI party won 102 seats of the 395-seat parliament, while another liberal party, PAM, secured 87 seats and the conservative Istiqlal took 81 seats. The former ruling moderate PJD Islamists suffered a crushing defeat with just 13 seats.
Turnout in Wednesday's elections was 50.3%, up from 43% in 2016 and the highest since polls in 2002.
