United Nations Apologizes To Algeria For Distortions Targeting Western Sahara Issue

UN Secretariat apologized to Algeria after the UN Press Service published false reports on Western Sahara by two signatories of a petition on Western Sahara that is committed to studying the issue closely.

Following the request of the Fourth Committee for decolonization of the United Nations to publish a memorandum on the distorted statements that are attributed to two signatories on a petition on Western Sahara, the representative of the Secretariat of the United Nations apologized to Algeria, noting that the information was already been corrected.

In response to the concerns that were raised by Algeria over this mistake that was made by the press service, the Secretariat was studying the matter to find out what had happened.

In response, the Assistant Ambassador of Algeria to the United Nations made it clear that it was not an apology to Algeria but to the Fourth Committee as a whole, because that was damaging to both parties.

Chairman of the Fourth Committee of Venezuela, Rafael Dario Ramirez Carreno, who had asked for clarifications and apologies for these errors, shared the opinion of the representative of Algeria.

He said he was upset when he saw that the position of one of the signatories, who did not give his opinion was attributed to a position that is not his usual position, as this greatly hurts by the discussion and called on the Secretariat to publish a memorandum that explains the situation.

The UN press services are involved in a serious manipulation case after the distortion of the content of interventions during the work of the Fourth Committee for decolonization, according to many participants in this UN annual meeting.

The United Nations press service misrepresented the statements of two interlocutors who expressed their support for the Sahara issue and went so far as to assign pro-Moroccan statements to two signatories of the petition who had not yet intervened, causing a blow to the credibility of the multilateral organization.

On Friday, Algeria asked the United Nations’ Press Service to provide clarifications on the matter, requesting clarification on the UN website.

In a statement to the APS from New York, the representative of the Polisario in the United Nations, Ahmed al-Bukhari, said that the Front “will demand an investigation into this serious slide” stressing that it “will pursue judicially those who are behind this forgery”.

The Sahrawi diplomat added: “Morocco’s position propagated to the full coverage of the work of the Fourth Committee “.

Many participants noted that the daily reports that were published by the United Nations were disproportionate and biased to Morocco’s thesis on Western Sahara and the editors went so far as to include comments and analyzes, while they should have been published only statements.

Al-Bukhari Ahmed explained that “the coverage scenario itself was raised” during the Fourth Committee, adding that it was a “planned slide by this service, which is dominated by the Moroccan intelligence agents who went to the maximum extent of fraud by making statements that are loyal to Morocco while I did not take the word.”

Susan Schulte, head of the Western Sahara Foundation, USA, said in a statement on Thursday that she had not referred to Morocco’s autonomy plan and had called for Morocco to withdraw from Western Sahara occupied territories.