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SPS Finnish NGOs call EU and UN to compel Morocco respect Saharawi people’s freedoms and right to self-determination
26.10.05
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Helsenki, 26/10/2005 (SPS) 7 Finnish organisations called on all the members of the UN’s Security Council, in a letter they sent to Ambassadors of these Members on Monday, to "exert all diplomatic efforts" to compel Morocco stop its systematic violations of human rights in Western Sahara and enforce the UN’s Peace Plan for the self-determination of the people of Western Sahara (Baker Plan).
The 7 NGOS called on the members of the Security Council to "present firm resolution, condemning the Moroccan denial of human rights in Western Sahara and calling for Morocco’s commitment to the Peace Plan for Self-determination of the People of Western Sahara, as accepted by the UN Security Council and the Frente POLISARIO in 2003".
"The continuation of the political deadlock between the parties is highly disappointing", the NGOs considered, underlining that "Morocco has continuously withdrawn its earlier commitments and undermined the Secretary-General’s efforts to reach a just, lasting and mutually acceptable political solution" to the conflict.
On another hand, the letter asked for UN’s Security Council’s intervention in the occupied territories of Western Sahara for the protection of the lives of more than 37 Saharawi political prisoners, and to put an end to Morocco’s systematic violations of Saharawi people’s fundamental rights.
Morocco is, in fact, "the sole party holding prisoners of war. It has not made concrete steps with regard to the hundreds of persons unaccounted for in the occupied territories", the text stressed asking the UN’s Security Council to "exert all diplomatic efforts to safeguard the health of the Saharawi hunger strikers and political prisoners", in hunger strike for the 7th day so far.
Further the
signatories of the letter are "deeply concerned of the recent persecution and
illegal detention of human rights activists in Western Sahara", and consider
that "an independent and transparent investigation into the allegations of
torture remains to be undertaken", in the Saharawi territory under Moroccan
occupation and which is submitted to medias and military siege since its
invasion in 1975.
"The present humanitarian situation is intolerable for the indigenous peoples of
Western Sahara. Their basic rights, especially freedoms of conscience and
expression and the right to self-determination have been systematically denied
since 1975. At the same time, over 160 000 refugees have lived in exile for 30
years in the most deplorable conditions in Algeria. The long-awaited referendum,
as originally agreed by both parties to take place in September 1991, is yet to
be organized", the letter concluded.
The letter, of which SPS received a copy, was signed by the Finnish Peace Committee, Peace Union in Finland, the Committee of 100 in Finland, the Finnish Psychologists for Social Responsibility, Finnish UN Association, Finnish Refugee Council and International Solidarity Foundation. (SPS)
060/090/000 261110 Oct 05 SPS
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SPS The Greens call UN and EU to oeuvre so as to stop Moroccan repression in the occupied territories
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Kyiv, 26/10/2005 (SPS) The European Green Party called the United Nations and the European Union, on Sunday, to adopt all necessary measures to put an end to Moroccan Government’s human rights’ violations in Western Sahara, indicates a resolution adopted by the Party during its 3rd Council meeting held between the 21st and 23rd October in Kyiv.
"For 30 years the Saharawi civil society has been subjugated to the Moroccan Government through politics that suppress and violate individual and collective rights" of Saharawis, the resolution put, "therefore, it is high time we support them strongly (Saharawi people). Either each member State individually or the European Parliament must take all necessary measures to stop" this systematic policy of repression, which is adopted by Rabat as a system in Western Sahara.
The international community, which "has taken a passive attitude" regarding the conflict, allowed "Morocco to persistently violate international legality and UN resolutions".
Further, Morocco persist "obstructing many peace initiatives as well as any possibility of holding a referendum on the Saharawis’ self-determination", the Party underlined.
It further estimated that the organisation of "a referendum could put an end to this conflict that stems from the process of decolonization of the African countries".
The European Green Party called "for a clearer and firmer positioning of the international community (with the UN and the EU in front) in order to watch over the observance of international legality" in Western Sahara, the text concludes. (SPS)
060/090/000 261120 Oct SPS
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SPS Mr. Abdelaziz denounces Moroccan Government’s "intransigence"
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Bilbao, 25 /10/2005 (SPS) The President of the Republic, Mohamed Abdelaziz, denounced "the intransigence of Morocco" and affirmed that Western Sahara’s problem must be resolved "conforming to international legality", during a reception Mayor Inaki Azkuna organised on his honour on Tuesday in the Basque country.
Mr. Abdelaziz deplored "the indifference of the international community which does not exercise enough pressures to impose the respect of the international legality" in Western Sahara, denouncing at the same time "the colonial brutality" of Morocco who denies "Saharawi people’s right to self-determination and independence".
He further estimated that the Moroccan authorities reacted in "brutal and repressive" way in the face of "peaceful demonstrations" organised by Saharawi citizens. Mr. Abdelaziz also called for the exercise of "pressures on Morocco" to complete the decolonisation process and to lift the "siege imposed on the territory, closing it to international observers and press".
The Head of the State declare that the movement of "peaceful protest" Saharawi citizens organise in the "occupied territories and in the south of Morocco" starting from last May the 21st, "is an expression of frustration from this situation of blockage" of the referendum process. (SPS)
010/090/666 261305 oct 05 SPS
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SPS Security Council "must call on Morocco to accept the Baker plan" Algerian Representative to the UN underlines
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New York (United Nations), 26/10/2005 (SPS) UN’s Security Council "must reiterate its support to the Baker plan and call Morocco directly to accept and enforce it (...) with no ambiguity", Algerian Permanent Representative to the UN, Abdallah Baali, underlined, reported Algerian Press Service, APS.
Intervening during the consultations of the UN’s Security Council on Western Sahara, Monday evening in New York, Mr. Baali noted that the "Security Council can continue no more in been tolerant with Morocco, unless it wants to back injustice".
"We have here a non-self-governing territory registered by the UN’s Committee on decolonisation, and which was illegally occupied by a neighbouring State (...) which is obstinately refusing to withdraw from it", Algerian Ambassador said.
"It is only disposed (...) to give it more autonomy within the framework of the Moroccan sovereignty and territorial integrity", he added.
In this respect, he underlined that "if Morocco could and can act that way (...) it is because it takes profit of an unconditional support, within the Security Council, that hinders any commanding action or even pressures".
"Because the Security Council was unable to assume its responsibilities, while he fully did, Mr. James baker did not have other choice but to leave", he recalled.
"Now, we are again in front of the impasse. We have a new Personal Envoy who visited the region and who came back to tell us that Polisario Front is ready to play the game, sign the peace plan and enforce it while the other party is only disposed to think about a status of autonomy for Western Sahara. What would the Security Council do then?", he wondered.
On another hand, the Algerian diplomat called on the Security Council to "send a firm message to Morocco that it can no more close the territory to international NGOs and medias and to violate the most fundamental rights of Saharawi citizens".
"It is a pity that the Bureau of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, which is so quick in reacting to the slightest human rights’ violations in this or that country, remained silent regarding the tragedy Saharawis lived in the territory these last months despite the mobilisation of a NGO such Amnesty International" Mr. Baali deplored.
In this regard, he recalled that the UN has got a "politic and legal responsibility to assume regarding the populations of non-self-governing territories". "And when the Bureau of the High Commissioner for Human Rights decides to investigate the situation prevailing in the Western Sahara, it proceeded in a way to please Morocco and chose to also investigate on Moroccan allegations concerning the situation of "its sequestrated citizens", that it is to say Saharawi refugees in the refugee camps in Tindouf", he added.
"It is this odious symmetry, he underlined, that puts the aggressor and the victim at the same level that undermines this organisation, compromise its credibility and damage its image and prestige".
Recalling that Polisario Front has released, for humanitarian reasons, the last Moroccan prisoners of war, Mr. Baali indicated that it was "important that Morocco release the hundreds Saharawi prisoners of war and political detainees in its custody".
The Security Council "has got the duty to assume its responsibilities regarding this question" the Algerian diplomat stressed.
On another hand, Mr. Baali reaffirmed that Algeria fully supports the UN’s Secretary General’s recommendation regarding the prorogation of the MINURSO’s mandate for another 6 months, stressing however that "these six months must been used by the Secretary General to convince Morocco rally the peace plan of Mr. Baker and enforce it". (SPS)
010/090/700 261539 oct 05 SPS
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SPS 14 Saharawi student arrested in the occupied El Aaiun"
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El Aaiun (occupied territories), 26/10/2005 (SPS) 14 Saharawi students were arrested by Moroccan forces of occupation in the occupied capital of Western Sahara, El Aaiun, after demonstrations organised Monday and Tuesday, to protest against the Moroccan colonisation, held in the majority of the schools and secondary schools of the city, indicated eye witnesses.
The arrested students "are still detained in police station where they are submitted to interrogations and torture", their families indicated, noting that the families’ houses were ransacked and robed by Moroccan colonial force "to intimidate us and take revenge against our children", some members of the families said.
On another hand, Saharawi student of the secondary school "Black March" (as it was named by students instead of Green March) of the holly city of Smara organised on Wednesday similar demonstrations in solidarity with their compatriots of El Aaiun and to demand the independence of their country, as well as the respect of human rights in Western Sahara.
With respect to Saharawi human rights activists in the occupied territories of Western Sahara, they launched an appeal to the international community to put pressures on Morocco so as to "ameliorate the conditions of detention of Saharawi political prisoners (in the Carcel Negra of El Aaiun) in hunger strike since last October the 19th.
They also asked for their right to receive visits of their families, who were "banned since last October the 17th an who were brutalised in front of the doors of the prison and transported, for some of them, to the police stations to intimidate them".
These same families had denounced, on Tuesday, the conditions of detention of their relatives and asked for the fulfilment of the latter’s claims, adding that the hunger-striking prisoners are "deprived of all external contact while there is a phone in the prison", and "do not benefit of medical care". (SPS)
010/090/110/TRD 261619 oct 05 SPS
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SAHARA
PRESS SERVICE