Geneva (UN Human Rights Council) 16 Jue 2026 (SPS) — In a closing remark of a high-level side-event organized at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on Tuesday, Ambassador Oubi Buchraya Bachir, Special Advisor to the Sahrawi President and Head of the Committee on Natural Resources and Legal Affairs, warned that bypassing established international law in Western Sahara sets a dangerous precedent that directly threatens global multilateralism and regional stability in North Africa.
Speaking at this high-level event titled "Western Sahara and the Right to Self-Determination: Challenges to International Legality," the Sahrawi diplomat delivered a detailed review of unilateral political maneuvers and Moroccan diplomatic narratives.
Ambassador Oubi opened his intervention by connecting the Sahrawi struggle directly to the integrity of the modern international rules-based order, noting that global institutions are currently facing unprecedented systemic challenges.
"We are discussing today the credibility of international law, the effectiveness of multilateral institutions, and the universality of the right of peoples to self-determination at a time when respect for international law is facing unprecedented challenges," Oubi stated.
He added that "the lack of progress in the decolonization process and this tendency within the actual international context creates a dangerous precedent for multilateralism and the future of the remaining 17 Non-Self-Governing Territories still struggling for their self-determination."
The Ambassador explicitly linked the resolution of the Western Sahara conflict to the broader security of the Maghreb region. He characterized Morocco as an expansionist actor with structurally unresolved borders, warning that appeasing Rabat's territorial ambitions in Western Sahara risks triggering wider regional chaos.
"Morocco is the only country in the world that doesn’t have any of its borders formalized with neighbours," Oubi noted, pointing to historical and ongoing friction with Spain, Algeria, Mauritania, and Western Sahara.
He underscored that Sahrawi resistance, backed by international legality, has served as the primary barrier against Moroccan expansionism. "the weakening of self-determination in Western Sahara would open the apetite of Morocco to new adventures. The narratives are already there. Therefore, the stability in this region depends largely on the proper decolonisation of the territory in accordance with international law."
Addressing recent diplomatic developments, Oubi dismantled Moroccan media narratives surrounding the UN Security Council's framework and ongoing joint UN-US diplomatic efforts.
He emphasized that the last Security Council’s resolution explicitly reaffirms the centrality of the right to self-determination as the core objective of any political solution to the conflict, grounding its legal basis strictly within the UN Charter. Furthermore, Resolution 2797 clearly identifies the Polisario Front and Morocco as the two direct parties to the conflict, emphacizing that any solution should be mutually acceptable, while simultaneously extending the operational mandate of MINURSO for a full year without any structural or operational modifications.
While acknowledging that joint UN-US diplomatic efforts successfully brought both parties face-to-face for the first time in six years, allowing each side to present its proposal, the Sahrawi diplomat firmly corrected the narrative regarding who is acting responsibly.
He stressed that Moroccan propaganda attempts to polish Rabat’s image, presenting it as a positive participant in negotiation, while the truth is that the Polisario Front’s responsible and constructive engagement is what has allowed UN efforts to continue for decades, while Morocco has consistently acted as the obstructionist.
The Ambassador stressed that the Polisario Front is negotiating in good faith to reach a just and lasting solution that guarantees the Sahrawi people’s right to self-determination, emphasizing that "sovereignty over Western Sahara belongs exclusively to the Sahrawi people, and the final status of the territory can only be determined by them."
The Sahrawi diplomat concluded his address with an assessment of the disastrous human rights and humanitarian situation in the occupied territories of Western Sahara, warning international stakeholders against endorsing any proposal that does not respect international law.
Pointing to the systematic human rights violations, the media blockade, the routine expulsion of international observers, and the arbitrary detentions occurring daily in the occupied territories, he closed his final intervention by reaffirming that "proposing so-called autonomy under these conditions is tantamount to throwing the Sahrawis into an abyss, and an open invitation for them to join the open-air prison that the occupied territories represent today." (SPS)
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