Frequent Meetings Between American Officials With Algerian and Moroccan Counterparts
The United States of America holds frequent and repeated meetings with Algerian officials and their counterparts in the Moroccan regime.
In less than two months, Washington organized two meetings with officials in Algiers and Rabat, a development that made many observers wonder about the background of these meetings and their timing.
The last of these meetings was between the Ambassador of Algeria to the USA and former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sabri Boukadoum, and the US Deputy Assistant Secretary in charge of North African Affairs, Joshua Harris, according to what was stated in a post by the Algerian Embassy in Washington, on the “X” platform, formerly Twitter.
The Algerian Embassy in Washington, Friday, January 5, 2023, said in a tweet that: “The Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of the People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria to the United States of America, H.E. Sabri Boukadoum started off his meetings with U.S. officials by receiving Mr. Joshua Harris, Deputy Assistant Secretary for North Africa.
The tweet stated that “the meeting was an opportunity to reaffirm the importance of continuing to strengthen the bilateral relations and to discuss several regional issues of common interest”.
Exactly ten hours after the Algerian Embassy to the USA posted its tweet, the U.S. State Department for Near Eastern Affairs posted on the “X” platform stating that DAS Joshua Harris met with Moroccan Ambassador Her Highness Princess Lalla Joumala to thank her for her tremendous contributions to the relationship over the last 7 years. They discussed our historic partnership and deepening security, political, and cultural cooperation”.
The US DAS in charge of North African Affairs visited Algeria last December,10, and was received during this visit by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the National Community Abroad, Ahmed Attaf, and the Secretary-General of the Ministry, Lounas Maghraman. This visit was followed by a statement from the US State for Foreign Affairs indicating that the discussions touched on the situation in the Middle East, about the Zionist aggression against the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, and support for the United Nations’ efforts to achieve progress on the Western Sahara issue as well.
The same American official moved to the Kingdom of Morocco, on December 17, that is, about a week after he visited Algeria. Then the US State Department for Near Eastern Affairs tweeted, saying after the visit: “Deputy Assistant Secretary Harris travels to Rabat, Morocco on Dec 17-18 to consult on further strengthening the U.S.-Morocco partnership and to review a range of regional security priorities, including events in Gaza and the UN process on Western Sahara”.
It was clear from the US State Department’s statements that the two issues that took Washington’s attention during these meetings were the Zionist aggression against the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, which is considered the first sensitive issue in the world during the last three months. The second issue is Western Sahara, which the American administration headed by Joe Biden, also gives importance to, but to no avail.
Although former US President Donald Trump tweeted during his last days in the White House, supporting the alleged sovereignty of the Moroccan regime over the occupied Sahrawi lands, the US administration under his successor Joe Biden, after more than three years as president, did not speak for a single day about Morocco’s sovereignty over Western Sahara lands and continued to confirm, every time an official visited Algeria or the Alawite Kingdom, that Washington supports the efforts of the United Nations envoy to Western Sahara, Staffan de Mistura, noting that the UN body currently recognizes only one proposal to resolve this issue, which is holding a referendum for self-determination in Western Sahara that would enable the Sahrawis to decide their fate.
