King seeks UN help on W Sahara
RABAT: Morocco’s King Mohammed VI has called on the United Nations to take “urgent measures” following months of tensions with the Polisario independence movement in the disputed Western Sahara region.
The king talked with UN SecretaryGeneral Antonio Guterres, denouncing the Polisario Front, which for decades has sought self-determination for the desert region, according to a royal cabinet statement.
During a telephone call, King Mohammed pointed to the “repeated incursion of armed Polisario elements and their acts of provocation” in Guerguerat, an area in disputed Western Sahara near Mauritania.
Polisario declared an independent republic in the disputed desert land in the 1970s and fought a guerrilla war with Morocco until a 1991 ceasefire. The group accuses Rabat of breaking the terms of the ceasefire last year by trying to build a road in the UN buffer zone. Morocco says it was just a roadclearing operation that broke no terms of the ceasefire.
The standoff in Guerguerat last year forced UN troops to step in after Moroccan gendarmerie crossed past a near the rn wall marking Moroccan-controlled areas and the Po lisa rio responded in kind. Their units remain facing each other less than 1km apart.
During the call with Mr Guterres, the king described the situation as “seriously threatening the ceasefire and putting regional stability at risk”.
For the Polisario Front, Morocco is to blame for what they describe as a “critical and dangerous situation”.
“Morocco wants to construct this road in Guerguerat that involves the annexation of territory that is beyond the Moroccan wall,” the Polisario Front Coordinator with the UN, M’hamed Khadad, said. “It is Morocco that should take entire responsibility for this crisis.”
Rich in phosphate, Western Sahara has been contested since 1975 when Spanish colonial powers left. Morocco claimed the territory and fought the 16-year war with Polisario before signing the UN ceasefire that foresaw a referendum on self-determination. But that vote has never happened.