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SPS Human Rights' Rafto Prize calls for the release of the 37 Saharawi Prisoners of Opinion 25.09.05
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El Aaiun (occupied territories), 25/09/2005 (SPS) the Human Rights' Rafto prize 2002 winner, Sidi Mohamed Dedech, launched an urgent call of solidarity and support to the 37 Saharawi prisoners of Opinion, on hunger strike in Moroccan jails for more than 40 days so far, reported Mr. Dedech in a press release he published Saturday in El Aaiun.
"The Saharawi political prisoners are, nowadays in a very serious state of health. Most of them are unable to stand straight by their own. This is for instance the case of Mr. Hmad Hammad who is really in difficult state, with both hands and legs paralysed, and Mrs Aminetou Haidar, who is suffering from the same situation in addition to heart and stomach illnesses, indicates the press release.
The text also reports about the situation of Ali Salem Tamek, Brahim Nourmia, Mohamed Elmoutawakil, Hussien Lidri, Abdarrahmane Bougarfa, Sid’Ahmed Elmoussawi and Louali Ameidan who are on "in very serious state".
On another hand, it denounced "the denial of the right to visit their sons to the families of prisoners" by the Moroccan colonial authorities in 3 Moroccan prisons, where a dozen prisoners are incarcerated without judgment since their arrest last May after their participation in peaceful demonstrations claiming for Saharawi people’s right to self-determination.
"Cet appel est dirigé à toute l’opinion publique internationale et toutes les organisations de défense des droits de l’homme afin de sauver la vie de ces prisonniers politiques qui se trouvent dans une situation d’extrême gravité", a-t-il conclu.
"This appeal is addressed to the whole international public opinion and all human rights organizations to save the lives of those prisoners of opinion, who are living a tremendously serious situation", Dedech concluded.
Mr. Dedech, the former prisoner of opinion who spent over than 24 years in Moroccan jail under death sentence that was reduced to an imprisonment for perpetuity, made a similar urgent call last June to Norwegian human rights organization "Rafto", and other international organizations world wide asking them to pressure Moroccan authority to compel it "immediately and unconditionally" release Saharawi prisoners of opinion.
Rafto Price was created in 1986 by the Foundation that bares the name of the Norwegian professor, Thorolf Rafto, who dedicated a great party of his existence to the defence of human rights, it should be recalled.
Three winners of Rafto Prize have won Noble Prize for Peace, mainly Mr. Kim Dae-Jung, President of Korean Republic (2000), Mr. José Ramos Horta, East Timor (1993), and the leader of the opposition in Burma, Mrs. Aung San Suu kyl, (1990). (SPS)
070/TRD/090/110
250951 sept 05 SPS
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SPS New look for the Carcel negra to receive the international press
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El Aaiun (occupied territories), 25/09/205 (SPS) The Carcel negra (Black Prison) in El Aaiun started to have a new look in an attempt of the Moroccan colonial authorities to erase the horrible impression revealed by some photos that unveiled the horrors lived inside that prison and publicised on Internet, showing prisoners gathered like sardines and others sleeping in W.C, reported concordant sources from El Aaiun.
Eye witnesses informed SPS that the administration of the prison is working hard, during these last 3 days, to paint the walls of the prison, the buildings and to remedy to the terrible hygienic conditions of the place that did not change since the hasty withdrawal of the former Spanish colonial power in 1975.
Observers think that all this preparations are undertaken to receive the visit of a delegation of the international press, expected to come in El Aaiun. The Moroccan colonial authorities established a "guided" programme for the delegation to attempt to promote "the advantages of the colonial occupation of the Western Sahara and the 'civilisation' virtues of the new coloniser, as well as the 'great' economical and social 'achievements' in what they call their provinces of the south".
In this respect, and to get ready to the visit of this delegation to the Carcel negra, 72 detainees were transferred to other Moroccan prisons out of sight, while reliable reports talk about another possible transfer of more than 400 other prisoners so as to relieve the overcrowding of this "duplicate of the Nazis’ concentration camps", one of the detainees said.
A diplomatic source indicated to SPS that the preparations were undertaken because of the statement of the UN’s spokesperson, Stephan Dujarric, last September the 21st, that talked about UN’s concern about the hardships of the 37 Saharawi political prisoners in hunger strike for the 45th day in Moroccan prisons. He said that this theme is thoroughly studied by the President of the UN’s Committee for Human Rights, Louise Arbour.
Last Mai 2004, The Moroccan Consultative Council for Human Rights (CCDH) reported that the numbers of prisoners in the carcel Negra is "470% superior to the real capacity of the prison", it should be recalled. (SPS)
010/090/110/ALG/TRD 251435 sept 05 SPS
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SPS Brahim Ghali qualifies the visit that will be organised by the Spanish press to El Aaiun as ''a scenario''
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Madrid, 25/09/2005 (SPS) Poliario Front’s Delegate to Madrid, Mr. Brahim Ghali, considered, Sunday, that the visit to be organised by the Moroccan Government, starting from Monday, for a delegation of Spanish press to the occupied territories of Western Sahara, as "a scenario".
This new manoeuvre is in fact a pitiful attempt aimed at "ameliorating the reputation of the Moroccan Government, which was undermined because of the repression Rabat exercises in the occupied territories and the human rights violations. It tries to give the false impression, to the Spanish and international opinion that human rights are respected in Western Sahara", he affirmed in a statement to the Algerian Press Service, APS.
The Saharawi delegate indicated that the preparations undertaken for this visit have started last Thursday through a visit undertaken by the Secretary General of the Moroccan Minister of Justice to the Carcel negra (Black Jail) in El Aaiun.
As a result to this visit, he emphasised, 72 prisoners were transferred last Friday in buses to the prison of Ait Melloul in Agadir (Morocco) so as to 'relieve the overcrowded'' Carcel negra.
He said that this measure was adopted after the diffusion in the Spanish press of photos showing the "inhumane" conditions in which the prisoners are living in the Carcel negra, ''gathered one on another in cells'' like sardines.
''If it is really a free visit, without constraints, then the members of the delegation should be allowed to meet with the Saharawi political prisoners, human rights’ activists in El Aaiun, Smara, Dakhla and other cities of Western Sahara as well as the peaceful demonstrators who were brutalised, repressed and tortured", Mr. Ghali said.
The Saharawi diplomat indicated that, the Spanish delegation is expected, within the framework of this scenario, to meet with "those who betrayed their people and who will be in charge of backing the Moroccan official version" on the events that took place in Western Sahara.
He added that the programme of visit would probably include a visit to some installations in the coasts of El Aaiun to ''give the illusion of the existence of a dynamic development in Western Sahara, which is absolutely untrue", he affirmed, APS added. (SPS)
060/090/700/ALG 251821 sept 05 SPS
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SPS Concluding its works the EUCOCO decides to increase its support to the resistance of the Saharawi population under Moroccan occupation'
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Brussels, 25/09/2005, (SPS) The 31st Conference of the Committees of support to the Saharawi people (EUCOCO), held in General Assembly in the 23, 24 and 25th of September 2005 in SUN PARKS –MOL– (Belgium), ended its works Sunday and decided to "undertake its current and future actions within the framework of the support to the Saharawi people’ popular resistance", especially in the occupied territories of Western Sahara, indicated a final press release that culminated the works of this meeting.
EUCOCO is "determined to undertake its current and future actions within the framework of the support to the movement of the Saharawi people’ popular resistance against the systematic human rights violations by Morocco (repression, arrests, abductions), especially in the occupied territories. These practices aims at killing Saharawi people’s aspirations to exercise its inalienable and legitimate right to self-determination", the text of the press release writes.
The 31st Conference called the international public opinion to "react so as to immediately stop human rights’ violations", committed daily by the Moroccan forces of occupation against the Saharawi helpless population, the protection of their properties, as well as the "assurance of free access into the occupied territories to independent observers and to human rights organisations".
Reaffirming its solidarity with the victims of the terrible Moroccan repression, the 31st Conference of EUCOCO adopted a whole programme of action "to help the detainees and their families so as they can face the terrible hardships the Moroccan authorities are subjecting them to".
In this respect, it confirmed "its solidarity with the prisoners of opinion and political detainees, in hunger strike since more than 45 days to denounce their detention’s conditions and demand the respect of human rights and of Saharawi people’s", the text adds.
On another hand, the Conference hailed the "courageous" position expressed by the Moroccan political party "Annahj Ademocrati" (the democratic path), which does not stop calling its Government to "respect Saharawi people’s right to self-determination".
The 31st Conference gathered the activists of the European movement of support to the Saharawi people with the presence of an important delegation of the Algerian National Committee of support to the Saharawi people (CNASPS).
Chaired by Prime Minister, Mr. Abdelkader Taleb Omar, an important delegation took part to the works of the conference. It was composed of Mr. Mohamed Sidati, Minister Counsellor at the Presidency delegated to Europe, Mr. Salek Bab Hassana, Minister of Cooperation, Mr. Mohamed Cheikh, S.G of the Saharawi Workers’ union (UGTSARIO), Mohamed Mouloud, S.G of Youth Union (UJTSARIO), Abdeslam Omar, President of the Association of the families of Saharawi Prisoners and Disappeareds (AFAPREDESA) and Mrs. Fatma El Mehdi, SG of Saharawi Women union (UNMS). (SPS)
060/090/ALG 252111 sept 05 SPS
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SPS EUCOCO recalls Spain of its political responsibility in the decolonisation of her ex-colony
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Brussels, 25/09/2005, (SPS) ) The 31st Conference of the Committees of support to the Saharawi people (EUCOCO), held in General Assembly in the 23, 24 and 25th of September 2005 in SUN PARKS –MOL– (Belgium), recalled to Spain her "historical and political responsibilities" in the decolonisation of Western Sahara, criticising the Moroccan intransigence and the policy of escape adopted by Rabat so as to hinder the peaceful denouement of the conflict, indicated a final press release that culminated the works of this meeting.
"At the eve of the 30th anniversary of the Tripatrite Accords of Madrid, the 31st conference seize the occasion to recall Spain of her historical and political responsibilities in the decolonisation of Western Sahara, and call her to anule these accords", which are illegal and shameful, the press release underlined.
Hailing "the release of the last Moroccan prisoners of war by the Polisario Front", who proves thus "to have a high sens of responsibility and attchment to the international legality", the Eucoco regretted the lack of reciprocity from the Moroccan Goverment, chich "persists in her policy of intransigence, refuse to cooperate with the ICRC so as to release the 151 Saharawi prisoners of war" and account for "more than 500 Saharawidisappeards, recognised and listed by the specialised international organisations".
"The kingdom of Morocco continues adopting a negative colonial attitude, developing thus a strategy based on confrontation, rushing ahead, erecting new obstacles in the way of the process of settlmenet, after every progress made by the international legality, as i twas the case when he refused to enforce the UN’s Security Council’s resolution 1495, which stressed Saharawi people’ right to self-determination", the text affirmed.
On another hand, the Conference underlined that "the dishonest and unworthy attempt of Morocco to use Algeria as a scapegoat", accusing her of been behind the stalemate of the Western Sahara dossier, "is a fable that misleads nobody anymore".
"The aggressively against Algeria, and the repeated anti-democratic practices of blackmailing and sabotage of the EUCOCO and the movement of solidarity actions must stop and their planners condemned", the text put.
On another hand, the conference denounced "the signing by the European Union of fishing accords with Morocco, which included Western Sahara’s territorial waters".
Such an accord, the press release underlines, is "null because it is a part of the policy of plundering of the natural resources of Western Sahara, a territory which is a subject to a process of uncompleted decolonisation".
Programmes of action were adopted by the Conference in the political and human rights domains as well as on the humanitarian aid situation. Groups of work also presented their reports on the Saharawi organisations (of Women, Youth and Workers...).
Important rendezvous are planed for: An international conference will be held in Spain, next November the 11 and 12, in commemoration of the sadly famous "Tripartite Accords of Madrid". Another international conference will be held, in February 2006, in the Saharawi refugee camps and in the liberated territories.
"These are two events that represent strong moments of solidarity with the Saharawi people and Saharawi struggle for the National liberation", the text concluded.
Finally, it should be noted that the participants to this 31st Conference have decided to hold the 32nd conference of the EUCOCO, next year, in the Basque Country in Spain. (SPS)
060/090/ALG 252141 sept 05 SPS
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SAHARA
PRESS SERVICE