Original Coverage & Source Attribution: www.tamilguardian.com
File photograph: A demonstration in Madrid in support of the Sahrawi people, November 2010. Photo: Cristianrodenas / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
The Polisario Front has said it will reject any “half-solutions” that circumvent the Sahrawi people’s right to self-determination and independence, as the UN Security Council prepares to discuss Western Sahara and renew the mandate of its mission in the territory this month.
Sidi Mohamed Omar, the Polisario Front’s representative to the UN and its coordinator with the UN Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO), said the movement would refuse “to enter into any discussion intended to prejudice our people’s right to self-determination”, the Sahara Press Service reported.
Speaking to Sahrawi TV on Sunday, he said the Polisario would only discuss measures that enable the Sahrawi people “to freely determine their own destiny”, and that they were prepared to make sacrifices to defend their rights.
He said the Security Council would hold its first session on Thursday to hear briefings from the UN Secretary-General’s personal envoy for Western Sahara, Staffan de Mistura, and the head of MINURSO, Alexander Ivanko.
Autonomy ‘as a basis’
The Council is expected to vote this month on renewing MINURSO’s mandate, which expires on 31 October, according to Security Council Report.
Last year’s resolution 2797 backed negotiations taking Morocco’s autonomy proposal as a basis. The plan, submitted in 2007, would integrate the territory into Morocco. The resolution also referred to a solution that “provides for the self-determination of the people of Western Sahara”.
The United States, which drafts the Council’s resolutions on Western Sahara, recognised Moroccan sovereignty over the territory in 2020. France backs the autonomy plan as the “only basis” for a solution, while the UK calls it the “most credible, viable and pragmatic basis”. Pakistan, which has emphasised self-determination, abstained on last year’s resolution.
Talks hosted by the US in Madrid and Washington in February brought together Morocco, the Polisario Front, Algeria and Mauritania for the first time since 2019, but made no progress in narrowing their differences.
Continuing hostilities
MINURSO was established in 1991 to organise a referendum on self-determination for the Sahrawi people, which has never been held. The Polisario Front ended its ceasefire with Morocco in 2020.
Hostilities have continued at a low to medium intensity. In May, rockets struck near Smara in Moroccan-administered Western Sahara, an attack claimed by the Polisario, and in June a reported Moroccan drone strike east of the berm killed the senior Polisario figure Lahbib Mohamed Abdelaziz and two others.
