16 May 2013
Philip Luther, Director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Programme
“Reports that the Moroccan authorities subjected these six detainees – including a child – to torture and other ill-treatment to extract ‘confessions’ are deeply disturbing. The allegations must be thoroughly investigated, with those responsible brought to justice.”
Polisario Front leader Mohamed Abdelaziz said on Friday Morocco’s “policy of fear and terror” in the Western Sahara had failed and that victory was in sight.
Abdelaziz, the self-styled Sahrawi president, was speaking on the 40th anniversary of the rebel group’s formation.
U.S. State Department.Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2012 : Western Sahara
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
“Morocco claims the Western Sahara territory and administers Moroccan law through Moroccan institutions in the estimated 85 percent of the territory it controls. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Saguia el Hamra and Rio de Oro (Polisario), an organization that has sought independence for the former Spanish territory since 1973, disputes Morocco’s claim to sovereignty over the territory.(…cont.)
Read report >>
April 9 2013 at 10:54am
New York - United Nations leader Ban Ki-Moon on Monday called for urgent international efforts to end the Western Sahara conflict because of fears the Mali war will spill over into the Moroccan-occupied territory.
Ban called on the UN Security Council to strengthen the UN peacekeeping mission in Western Sahara,
Press Releases
US leads movement to add human rights monitoring to the region’s 20-year-old UN peace-keeping mission
(Washington, DC – April 18, 2013) The RFK Center announced the release of a new report detailing grave human rights violations—including summary execution, enforced disappearance, torture, and arbitrary arrest—against the Sahrawi people of Western Sahara. On the eve of the report’s release, and just one week after the United States took historic action in drafting a human rights monitoring mandate for the UN’s peacekeeping mission in Western Sahara, RFK Human Rights Award Laureate Aminatou Haidar, known as the “Sahrawi Gandhi,” was placed under increased police surveillance.
By Louis Charbonneau
UNITED NATIONS | Thu Apr 18, 2013 1:53pm BST
(Reuters) - France, Morocco’s traditional protector on the U.N. Security Council, is unlikely to use its veto to block a U.S. proposal to have U.N. peacekeepers monitor human rights in the disputed territory of Western Sahara, envoys said.
By Louis Charbonneau and Aziz El Yaakoubi
UNITED NATIONS/RABAT | Tue Apr 16, 2013 8:29pm EDT
(Reuters) - The United States has proposed that the U.N. peace-keeping mission in the disputed territory of Western Sahara help monitor human rights there, U.N. diplomats said on Tuesday, an idea that has prompted an expression of regret from Morocco.
Human Rights Watch, April 17, 2013
To: All Members of the UN Security Council
Re: MINURSO Renewal
Dear Ambassador,
Human Rights Watch urges the Security Council, when it votes on renewing the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) this month, to extend the mandate to incorporate human rights monitoring in Western Sahara and in the Polisario Front-run refugee camps near Tindouf, Algeria. (…cont.)
Security Council Should Allow Monitoring for Violations
Philippe Bolopion, UN director, Human Rights Watch
April 17, 2013
(New York) – United Nations Security Council members should task the United Nations with monitoring human rights violations in Western Sahara and in the refugee camps around Tindouf, in Algeria, Human Rights Watch said today in a letter to all 15 Security Council member countries.
The GlobalDispatches : Politics
By Anna Theofilopoulou, March 31, 2013
The UN is persevering, but time is running out. The real cause for concern should be the growing number of young and disaffected people in the region.
In April of this year, the UN Security Council will engage in the annual ritual of the mandate renewal for the UN Mission for the referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO). This will involve discussing the report of the Secretary-General …(cont.)
