Western Sahara: No More Looking For the Mirage of Negotiations With Morocco

The French government’s decision to recognize the so-called “autonomy plan for the Western Sahara region” is a “dangerous deviation” from international legitimacy and will contribute to the officialization of the colonial reality of the Moroccan occupation, in violation of the will of the Sahrawi people and their consultation to determine the final status of the region, Sahrawi officials said.

Member of the National Secretariat of the Polisario Front, President of the Sahrawi National Council, Hamma Salama, told the Algerian Press Service “APS” that this new position is “a dangerous deviation that contradicts the role that France plays in the UN Security Council and as a member of the Friends of Western Sahara within the Council, which it is supposed to respect the United Nations resolutions and regulations and works to find a just solution to the issue of Western Sahara, which is still included in the United Nations list of territories subject to decolonization since 1963.”

Salama added that this public French deviation “endangers the efforts of the Personal Envoy to Western Sahara, Staffan de Mistura, and threatens the issue of international peace and security.”

This position comes, according to Salama, “at a time when the suffering of the Sahrawi people, who have been struggling for more than 50 years to establish their right to self-determination and independence guaranteed by all international laws and the United Nations, is deepening, this unjust decision will increase the resolve of the Sahrawi people.”

Accordingly, the Speaker of Parliament added; “the Sahrawi people will not be affected by the position of a state or individuals, but rather is determined to seize their right by supporting the armed struggle, national unity, steadfastness and cohesion to impose the will of the Sahrawi people for freedom and complete independence.”

For his part, a member of the permanent office of the National Secretariat of the Polisario Front, and Minister Counselor in the Presidency of the Sahrawi Republic, Bachir Mustapha Sayed, considered this aggressive and dangerous stance against the Sahrawi people as “hostile to international legitimacy,” as the colonial powers seek to support and consolidate Morocco’s occupation of the lands of Western Sahara.

Bachir Sayed explained that “France’s dangerous position” comes in a “tumultuous” international atmosphere characterized by many wars and crises that the world is suffering from, most notably the Palestinian issue.

Bachir believes this step “ended all bets on the viability of peacekeeping organizations and their makers, removed every mask of the falsity of its human rights and democratic views, and swept away the ugliness, violence, and bloodiness of its colonial reality.”

The Sahrawi official also considered the step as “the end of looking after the mirage of dialogue and negotiations with the Moroccan side,” which, according to him, requires “consolidating the Sahrawi ranks and continuing the struggle until the Sahrawi people are empowered with their rights.”

In turn, the representative of the Polisario Front in Switzerland and to the United Nations and international organizations in Geneva, Oubbi Bouchraya al-Bachir, expressed his regret at the dangerous position expressed by the French government.

The Sahrawi diplomat explained that the French position was “not surprising” and was the result of a group of French ministerial movements and visits to Rabat since the beginning of the year, through which explicit support for the Moroccan unilateral decisions and encouragement for investment in the occupied Western Sahara was expressed.

The Sahrawi diplomat stated, “France has in essence been adopting positions supportive of Morocco’s aggressive expansionist doctrine from the beginning of the conflict until now, reaching the limits of direct military intervention against the Sahrawi Liberation Army on more than one occasion.”