SAHARA PRESS SERVICE

Madrid, 08/05/2006 (SPS) The Saharawi human rights activist and ex-political prisoner, Aminetou Haidar, will receive, this afternoon in Madrid, the 5^th human rights Price "Juan Maria Bandrés" for the "defence of the right to exile and solidarity between the peoples", which will be delivered to her by the Spanish Committee of assistance to refugees (CEAR), according to a press release publicised by this institution.

This price is a recognition of "the exemplary engagement of Aminetou Haidar in favour of the Saharawi people’s legitimate right to freely decide on their future", CEAR stressed.

Dozens intellectuals and artists engaged in the Saharawi cause, whose tragedy languishes for more than 30 years, will participate to the ceremony of delivery of this price that will take place at 19.00 p.m in the "Auditorio de la Comisiones Obreras" (seat of a Spanish Trade Union) in Madrid, the organisers stressed.

39 years old and mother to two children, Mrs. Haidar was arrested for the first time in 1987 for having participated in a peaceful demonstration against the Moroccan illegal occupation of the Western Sahara at a moment when a UN’s ad-hoc Committee was visiting the territory.

She disappeared for 4 years in the Moroccan secret detention camps, undergoing all kinds of torture before been released in 1991. She was arrested many times because of her peaceful activities for the defence of the human rights in the Western Sahara, which is submitted to the Moroccan military occupation and to a permanent medias and security siege since 1975.

Release last January the 17th 2006 from the notorious Moroccan prison the Carcel Negra (Black Jail) in El Aaiun after she served a 7 months sentence, Mrs. Aminetou Haidar participated to many activities such as to the Committee of Coordination of the victims of forced disappearance and detention in the Western Sahara in 1994, the Committee for the release of Sidi Mohamed Deddech and all Saharawi detainees in 2002, an the Committee for the release of Ali Salem Tamek and all the Saharawi political prisoners in 2003.

Her appeal from the Carcel Negra on the occasion of the International Day against torture is impossible to forget:"...It is a miracle that I am still alive, because I am physically exhausted as a woman by all these years of forced disappearance and imprisonment, so much torture and repression. But I am still here and I will continue to fight with all my energy knowing that you are there struggling with us. I am convinced of this as I am convinced of the existence of the sea that is awaiting for me some 25 kilometres, and as I am convinced that these Saharawi children refugees in Algeria will come back to their free land. I am even more convinced of your support and of the tender sight of my own children, Mohamed and Hayat for whom I am badly missing". (SPS)

070/010/090/666/TRD 081422 May 06 SPS