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table of contents
State   House   UN & NGOs
Algeria   Morocco
reading   McKinney cite
news archive re W.Sahara
AFRICA homepg & Net tools
W E S T E R N SA H A R A
1999 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices re W.Sahara
Africa NewsWire   9/23/00 W.Sahara News   3/2/99 Mother Jones
soc.culture.maghreb alt.culture.morocco soc.culture.algeria
re W.Sahara: Washington Post   NYTimes   London Times
maps ¤   ¤
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Capital is El-Aaiun (La'youne) & official language is Arabic. Local currency is the Moroccan dirham (DH). Potential deposits of oil, natural gas, uranium, iron & phosphates.   Formerly Spanish colony of Rio de Oro, W.Sahara annexed by both Morocco & Mauritania when Spain withdrew Feb. 1976. After Mauritania withdrew from the territory in August 1979, it was incorporated into and administered by Morocco.
Polisario Front liberation movement continued, having suceeded against Mauritania with lots of landmines, & formed government-in-exile in 1976; declared Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic SADR. Polisario Front's SADR recognised 11/84 by Organisation for African Unity leading to the withdrawal of Morocco from the OAU in protest. In 1988, both Morocco & Polisario Front agreed to a U.N. settlement; ended many years of fighting 5/91 following UN sponsored peace settlement. Plan called for a referendum organized & conducted by UN Mission for Referendum in W.Sahara for Sahrawis to choose between independence or integration into Morocco. U.N. carry out identification process to determine, based on a census conducted by Spain in 1974, who was eligible to vote in the referendum.
W.Sahara per Index on Africa
Fed. Amer. Sci.
Refugees for 25 years   more
Resistance radio
active forum F 		5/11/00 "Migrants target Canaries as way into Europe"
LondonTimes   Thousands of illegal African immigrants are expected to arrive this summer on the beaches of the Canary Islands as the Spanish holiday resort becomes a beachhead into Europe for a new wave of desperate people. Local authorities on the islands, worried about the effect on an expected influx of ten million tourists, say they cannot cope with the avalanche of immigrants.
3/2/99 "North Africa's Forgotten War" Mother Jones
On one side are over 100,000 heavily armed conscripts, drafted from coastal cities and temperate mountain valleys, waiting behind a huge, fortified wall. The wall runs for nearly 800 miles, surrounded by razor wire, mine fields, and forts. On the other side are no more than 10,000 lightly armed, but highly mobile guerrillas, desert nomads who have fought their opponents to a standstill in a 24-year war.
On featureless sand hundreds of miles from any major cities and under temperatures as high as 122ºF, one of the most inhospitable regions on earth, life would be difficult under anything but the most affluent circumstances. The Sahawari, of course, aren't affluent. The refugees are kept alive by a huge and costly relief effort by the U.N. and various other agencies. Malnutrition, cholera, and access to water are constant problems. However, the Sahawari have created remarkable desert gardens, growing fresh fruit and vegetables, and have set up a free education and healthcare system, including schools, colleges, and hospitals. Several underground hospitals even operate on the front line, right under the Moroccans' noses. Furthermore, literacy has been raised from 1% to 95% in this period; many young Sahawaris go on to study at universities in other countries. 4.24.01   S/2001/398 SecGen rpt   Developments since prev. rpt 2.20.01 (S/2001/148). Personal Envoy activities, appeals process, prisoners of war, military & civilian police aspects, preparatory work for Saharan refugees repatriation and financial aspects. ext. UN Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) til 6.30.01 Incl table showing contributions to MINURSO 4.01 & MINURSO deployment 4.01 full documentation

9/28/00 "Morocco & Polisario renew peace talks"
BERLIN Reuters   Similar talks in London on June 28 ended without a resolution. "We are waiting to see what UN envoy James Baker will bring with him. But most important are points still obstructing implementation of U.N. peace plan. Main problem is one raised recently by Moroccan authorities when UN voters' identification committee announced results," Polisario's representative in Germany Zakaria Mohamed Alitold Algerian radio in interview monitored by BBC. Moroccan embassy official in Berlin said Foreign Minister Mohamed Benaissa was leading his delegation
Referendum, originally set for January 1992, repeatedly postponed due mainly to disagreement over who should be eligible to vote. About 130,000 people, most of them now in Morocco, appealed against rulings excluding them from the vote. When Spain left & war followed in 1976, Morocco annexed & moved settlers in.

9/22/00 NYC direct talks in Berlin 9/28,29/00 between Morocco and the Frente Popular para la Liberación de Saguia el-Hamra y del Rio de Oro (Frente POLISARIO) under SecGen Personal Envoy Jas. Baker III. Intended to "resolve multiple problems relating to implementation of settlement plan for W.Sahara & find agreement on mutually acceptable political solution," spokesman Fred Eckhard.
At present, Polisario's cause seems lost, their troops outnumbered by Morocco's, Libya's & especially Algeria's support for Polisario, a precondition for continued fighting, has dwindled as intl & African attention to claims on independence for W.Sahara has disappeared from the news headlines.

8/7/00 Magreb union seed development by State Dept

7/20/00 Reuters Morocco has recalled its ambassador to Qatar to protest broadcasts on the Qatari-based Al Jazeera satellite television channel, mainly over the coverage of W.Sahara, Moslem fundamentalism and Moroccan-Israeli ties.

7/18/00 ARSO   Morocco is demanding that 7,000 applications, rejected by the commission during the revision of voters, should be considered as valid. (Moroccan press 18.07.00)

7/17/00 Intl Federation of Leagues of Human Rights FIDH, notes, following a mission to Morocco at the end of June, that the number of disappeared in the course of the conflict in W.Sahara has risen to nearly 1500 people. [ that's 1% of remaining refugees ]

7/16/00 ARSO   "Ordinary Repression" In El Ayoun, a Moroccan military patrol opened fire on a group of young Saharawis, seriously wounding two people. (Polisario Front representation in Madrid). Same scenario at Smara, where a Moroccan soldier fired from his vehicle on a group of Saharawis. Units of the Moroccan army destroyed wells in Guelta Zemmour and Boujdour, these wells were used to water herds of animals. (Saharawi National Radio, 16.07.00)

7/14/00 ARSO   In letter to Security Council, Ahmed Boukhari, Polisario representative in New York, rejected any solution other than the referendum: "Any other approach, which involves deciding in place of the Saharawi people … compromises their inalienable right to self-determination". (SPS, 14.07.00) In an interview with the daily London Arabic paper, "Al Hayat", the Saharawi president strongly criticised Kofi Annan's latest report, which presents the settlement plan as impossible, and suggests the parties should look for a political solution. This report, he added, "does not reflect clearly the position of the Polisario Front" and confuses the responsibility of the two parties. On the other hand, Mohamed Abdelaziz continued,the Polisario Front "rejects categorically any kind of third way". "If UN settlement plan fails …, we will try by every possible means to arrive at our goal, total freedom and independence". Concerning the meeting of experts due in Geneva, the Saharawi president wondered if the UN was not manoeuvring to gain time to the advantage of Morocco, to the detriment of the Saharawi people. (SPS 17.07.00) "Nobody has mandated Kofi Annan to search for another solution to the conflict between the Saharawi people and the Moroccan regime", the Saharawi minister for Foreign Affairs stated during a press conference in Algiers. Mr Ould Salek said that Kofi Annan should be seeing that the peace plan is implemented. In Ould Salek's view, the "third way" is a "conspiracy to confiscate from the Saharawi people their legitimate right to self-determination. This conspiracy aims to put the peace plan in a fatal impasse and to substitute for it a totally fabricated solution called the "third way". Those pushing such solutions, he warned, "carry the entire reponsibility for the return to hostilities and the instability of the region". (Saharawi Ministry of Information 18.07.00)

7/5/00 "Sahara issue will be settled once Algeria withdraws from the dossier", sahrawi tribesmen
Several Sahrawi shioukh (Tribe Chiefs) and local elected representatives said Tuesday that the Sahara issue will be settled once Algeria withdraws from the dossier. The Sahrawis urged a visiting delegation of American staffers, led by Scott Palmer, to endeavor for lifting the blockade imposed by the Algerian-backed Polisario separatists against the Sahrawis in the camps of Tindouf (south-western Algeria). They gave the US delegation their testimonies regarding the blatant human rights violations perpetrated by the Polisario against the Sahrawis, especially the elderly, women and children. They presented cases of people whose bodies still bear scars of torture at the hands of the Polisario band in the desert camps of Tindouf.
The Polisario is on the list of the world's terrorist organizations, said Houcine Baida, head of the association of parents of Sahrawi citizens victims of terror in the camps. The victims said they were ready to help unearth digs where Sahrawis were buried by the Polisario. The speakers asked the US staffers to inform the Congress and the American public opinion of the real situation with a view to lifting the blockade imposed on the detainees of Tindouf. They stressed that the Polisario and its supporters are the sole responsible for the obstacles hampering the referendum. The consultation is bogging down in difficulties created by Polisario, which fearing Morocco's victory, seeks to shrink voters' rolls through denying the right of thousands of genuine Sahrawis to participate in the referendum. The US staffers had conferred with ambassador coordinator Mohamed Loulichki, MINURSO (UN mission supervising referendum process).

6/28/00 "Morocco, Polisario hold inconclusive Sahara talks"
LONDON Reuters   Former U.S. SecState James Baker brokered inconclusive talks on Wednesday between Morocco and the Polisario Front aimed at resolving the 25-year-old W.Sahara dispute. Baker, U.N. special envoy for the disputed region, oversaw "full and frank" discussions between the two sides, which could resume "at a later date", a United Nations spokesman said. He gave no details of the substance of the talks. Diplomats had said Baker would try to convince the two sides to pursue a "third way" solution after concluding there was little hope soon of fulfilling plans for a U.N.-mandated referendum to decide the future of the territory.
They said he had won strong backing from the United States and France to press for a solution based on granting autonomy to W.Sahara under Moroccan sovereignty. U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan said after the last round of talks in London in May that both sides had stuck to "widely divergent positions" and warned that unless they brought specific solutions to their next meeting they should "be prepared to consider and discuss other ways to achieve an early, agreed and durable solution".
But the Polisario, which has condemned alternatives to the referendum as a "conspiracy against the legitimate rights of the Sahrawi people", insisted that Baker did not propose any "third way" at Wednesday's talks. "No alternative way has been presented to the settlement (referendum) plan. It is still the only valid framework for a solution," Polisario's London representative Brahim Mokhtar, who attended the meeting, told Reuters.

5/14/00 "UN sponsored talks on W.Sahara begin in London"
LONDON AFP English   Former US secretary of state James Baker sat down with representatives from Morocco and the Polisario Front Sunday in a bid to clear the way for a referendum on the future of the disputed W.Sahara. Baker, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's special envoy, is to mediate in the behind-closed-doors talks, which could possibly last into Monday at Lancaster House. Mauritania, which like Algeria, borders the disputed territory, is also represented. It takes a neutral, observer's role in the talks.

4/6/00 W.Saharan President Mohammed Abdelaziz in D.C. "In 1998 Baker got Morocco & POLISARIO to agree in Houston to hold referendum & start resettling Sahrawis who fled. Over the past 10 years the U.N. also has spent more than $530 million on peacekeeping and humanitarian relief in W.Sahara. Pres. Abdelaziz, with W.Saharan Ambassador at Large Moulud Said acting as interpreter,'We will support Amb. Baker'"
4/4/00 British position

9/26/00 4th Committee Speakers call for more assistance for non-self governing territories
9/25/00 4th Committee begins debate on decolonization questions
2/29/00 Polisario releases 186 Moroccan POWs
1/5/00 UN completes voter identification
U.N. 1999 Refugee midyear report re W.Sahara
9/20/99 barrier to Magreb union revival
7/23/99 Hassan II dies; King Mohammed, age 35, acceeds to Moroccan throne
6/22/99 Special Decolonization Committee takes up questions related to E.Timor & W.Sahara

1/26/98 Deployment of Engineering unit & Admin staff to support MINURSO
9/16/97 Houston Agreement quoting ARSO 10/28/96 Assembly asked to encourage direct talks' resumption to speed W.Sahara peace process
10/10/96 4th Committee told economic viability must not justify delay in self-determination   [ nice idea but no longer possible in 2000 ]
10/9/96 Non-self governing territories reviewed by 4th Committee in continuing debate 9/13/00 IntlRelations Subcomm. Africa UN W.Sahara Referendum hearing "9 Years & Counting"
testify: Allen Keiswetter Deputy AsstSec Near Eastern Affairs, State Dept
Chairman Ed Royce recalled "vote to determine whether resource-rich W.Sahara is to be incorporated into Morocco or become an independent state was originally set for January 1992. 8 years & $440 miilion later, MINURSO, unfortunately, is far from its goal. … Baker has another meeting scheduled for later this month at which he will try to pull a diplomatic rabbit out of his hat but, short of that, I don't see why the U.S. should continue approving U.N. resolutions extending MINURSO."

9/24/98 Future of W.Sahara referendum Subcomm.Africa hearing 105th
10/29/97 Ed Royce [ coddles Baker as hearing witness ]
10/8/97 H.Res.245, self-determination for people of W.Sahara : Subcomm.Africa markup 105th
10/8&30/91 Examination of UN peace plan & referendum on W.Sahara Subcomm IOHR & Africa joint hearing & markup H.Con.Res.214, H.Con.Res.201, & H.R. 3406 102nd

checking up on new boy king 5wks after coronation
9/1/99 SecState Albright in Morocco & prelim briefing
Peacekeeping budget: MINURSO 1998 $13.2million 1999 $23.6 est 2000 $15million req
2/8/95 D.Bennet asstsec Intl Org Affairs at IOHR
economic report 2/11/00 SecDef Cohen in Morocco not one single policy statement of substance but
  FAILS TO DENY arms negotiations in response to direct question.
In 1998, one marine was the total U.S. troop count in W.Sahara. In 1995, 30
Web news: 9/24/00 Muslim rebels kill 12 people in Algeria, newspaper reports

8/26/00 Algerian newspaper 'Le Jeune Independant' website< /a>
Hopes of a reconciliation between Algiers and Rabat are fading. There are obvious unmistakable signs. Has Morocco chosen another way? Are the hawks back? In Morocco, the old speeches on the sacred cause [the W.Sahara] have made a comeback. In this sequence of events, the old demons are waking up. Unanimity on the W.Sahara issue is again reaffirmed. [King] Mohammed VI has already given us an idea on the royal palace's strategy in this affair. Algeria is thus directly targeted. In an interview with the US magazine `Time', Mohammed VI accused Algeria of having created the Saharan independence movement, the Polisario Front. He also accused Algeria of funding and arming these "mercenaries", adding, in the same magazine, that if there is a problem it is between Algeria & Morocco. This surprising statement has cast a chill in the relations between the two countries which are already fragile, and has brought to a halt the normalization process which the two countries launched with difficulty in the wake of Bouteflika's election as president and Mohammed VI's accession to the throne.
What is the reason behind this change of tone? Why this return to the extreme stands in the W.Sahara issue? Are these sudden changes not directly linked to the discovery of oil and gas deposits in the region of Talsinnt, in southwest Morocco? Have these important discoveries, according to the Moroccan authorities, not reinforced the supporters of the military solution in the Saharan conflict? All the more so since the confidential report of the Moroccan secret service, in [former Interior Minister] Driss Basri's time, clearly said that if the referendum for self-determination were to take place, the independence option would prevail. The war effort against the Polisario can now be sustained. Is this sentence by the Moroccan energy minister not revealing: "It is a strategic discovery which will not turn Morocco's economy into an economy based on unearned income [as published]." Are we heading for renewed hostilities between the Moroccan army and the Saharan army?

The creation of the Algerian League of Solidarity with the Saharan People, the first of its kind since the start of the W.Sahara conflict, is a new fact which will undoubtedly provoke hostile reactions towards Algeria from our Moroccan neighbours. Algerian civil society (associations, political parties) is now directly involved. It is a tit-for-tat reply to the Moroccan policy. The president of the Saharan Arab Democratic Republic [SADR] has welcomed this initiative. For Mr Mohamed Abdelaziz, this league "draws its inspiration from the [1st] November [1954] ideals which made Algeria into a symbol of struggle and liberation". In this respect, the Saharan leader revealed that the people and the army want to resume the war. These omens do not augur well.

U.N. Refugee index: 165,000 Sawaharis

State Dept 1999 Human Rights, Trade & Terrorism reports re Algeria
Algeria per Fed.AmerScientists

assimilation appeal
3/12/00 official Moroccan view on "reintegration" of W.Sahara into the Kingdom.
9/17/00 economic news   8/22/00 Oil discovery   2/14/00 Immigrant backlash in Spain
3/17/00 Mail & Guardian news summary   Web news

U.N. Refugee index 160 to 800
State Dept 1999 Human Rights & Trade reports re Morocco
Rabat U.S. embassy

Amazon re W.Sahara Thank you for convening this hearing on Western Sahara. As we would all agree, this is a very important moment in the referendum process to complete the struggle for independence for the Sahrawi people. I regret the recent breakdown of talks in Geneva on the future of the Western Sahara and the decision taken by the Moroccan delegation to walk out. It is obvious to all observers that Morocco apparently fears the outcome of this referendum. But unfortunately, nothing changes for the people of Western Sahara. While diplomats squabble and are unable to come to resolve this issue, the Western Sahara people continue to live under colonial rule.
Twenty-five years ago, in October 1975, the International Court of Justice denied to Morocco all territorial claims on Western Sahara and reaffirmed the right of the Western Sahara people to self-determination. Because the United States has done nothing to affirmatively adhere to this international ruling and to push for a final resolution of this issue in accordance with what is fair, I am saddened that my country stands on the wrong side of justice. This is not a new or unique position for my country. Because it did the same thing for twenty-five years in East Timor as it allowed its handpicked dictator of Indonesia to run over the rights of the East Timorese people.

Justice delayed is justice denied. And the Sahrawi people will not stand idly by and allow this injustice to persist. Just as the East Timorese have won their country back, so too will the people of the Sahrawi Republic. Time is on their side. And we don't make friends around the world by being on the wrong side of justice and human rights. In November, the people of this country will decide who will lead it for the next four years. The people of Western Sahara should be given the same opportunity. It is wrong for the international community to choose the Sahrawi leaders. The policy of our country should support the free expression of a people deciding on their future. Otherwise, the tide will surely turn against us.
Mr. Chairman, the current state of affairs is not sustainable and will surely deteriorate into something no one really wants. It will be the fault of those who did nothing when the call for freedom went out. History will not judge us well: those who choose to do nothing as the day of reckoning on the Sahrawi Republic draws near.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman for calling this important hearing and for allowing this testimony.

10/93 "Kashmiri view: Issue is Suppression of Self-Determination"
R.A. Khan, dir. L.A. based Kashmir HumanRights Fdtn The Washington Report p37
~ … In 1947, the British withdrew from India after partitioning it into Muslim Pakistan and Hindu India. Although the majority of his subjects were Muslim, the Hindu maharaja chose to link Kashmir to India. Since 1947 the two countries have fought three wars, two of them over Kashmir, and the third over the secession from Pakistan of East Bengal, now the independent nation of Bangladesh.
Pakistan now controls one third of the land area of Kashmir, and India occupies the rest, including the high, cool and scenic Vale of Kashmir, a favorite summer resort for British colonial administrators and subsequently a popular tourist attraction. The dispute over Kashmir was brought to the United Nations by India in 1948. All parties initially agreed to let Kashmiris exercise their right of self-determination through a U.N. sponsored plebiscite. American World War II hero, Adm. Chester Nimitz, was appointed plebiscite administrator. Forty-five years later, the plebiscite pledge remains unfulfilled.

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