The world’s last colony: Morocco continues occupation of Western Sahara, in defiance of UN

Picture by AlbertoDV. CC-BY-SA-3.0 via Wikimedia CommonsAt the 28th summit meeting of the
African Union (AU) held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on 30 January
2017, Morocco’s readmission to the continental body generated
heated discussion. At the end of the day the Kingdom of Morocco
managed to win over sufficient member states on its side and it was
allowed to join the fold unconditionally.

Morocco left the Organization of African Unity (OAU), precursor to
the AU, in 1984 after the OAU recognized the right to
self-determination and independence for the people of the Western
Sahara and admitted the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) that
was proclaimed in 1976 by the Sahrawi people’s Polisario Front.

It was in keeping with the OAU principle not to
recognize the occupation of any part of the continent that it
admitted the SADR to its membership. While SADR claimed sovereignty
over the Western Sahara territory, Morocco saw it as an integral part
of its own territory. Thus, rather than accept SADR’s independence,
Morocco left the OAU.

Since then Morocco has refused to join the AU unless the
organization withdraws the membership of SADR.

The occupation of Western Sahara

The area of Western Sahara has been occupied by Morocco since
1976 when Spain pulled out and relinquished its claim as a colonial
power over the territory. This former Spanish colony was then annexed
by Morocco. Sahrawi people, who fought Spanish colonial oppression,
were now forced to fight Moroccan occupation. They conducted
resistance struggle under the leadership of Polisario Front until
1991 when the United Nations (UN) brokered a truce.

A UN-supervised referendum on independence of Western Sahara was
promised in 1992 but it was aborted by Morocco. A UN peacekeeping
mission that was to organize the referendum has remained in the
territory ever since, while Morocco built a 2,700km-long sand wall,
with landmines.

SADR, headed by the Polisario Front, has been recognized by the AU
as the legitimate government in exile. For decades Morocco made
futile attempts to delegitimize SADR and Polisario. Eventually it
applied to rejoin AU without precondition.

AU member states argued that Morocco should not be readmitted
unless it accepts the 1960 UN Declaration on the Granting of
Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, which states that,
“All peoples have the right to self-determination; and by virtue of
that right they freely determine their political status.”

Morocco was also asked to accept unconditionally the OAU/AU
African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights which provides that:

Nothing shall justify the domination of a people by another. All
peoples shall have the unquestionable and inalienable right to
self-determination. They shall freely determine their political
status.

Thus, before readmission, Morocco should have accepted all the 33
Articles of the Constitutive Act of the AU with Western Sahara as a
founding member. Morocco should also accept the AU Act which
recognizes African colonial boundaries, thus making its continued
occupation of Western Sahara illegal.

Western Sahara thus remains the continent’s last colonial
outpost, occupied by another African state

All this was thrust aside and Morocco was readmitted to the AU
when 39 out of the 54 African member states voted for Morocco. They
tacitly endorsed the longstanding occupation of Western Sahara, while
Morocco refuses to comply with the successive UN resolutions on the
holding of a referendum on self-determination.

Western Sahara thus remains the continent’s last colonial
outpost, occupied by another African state. It is an albatross on the
African Union’s conscience, since it was a departure from its
founding principles.

The notable US professor Stephen
Zunes (a professor of politics and international studies at the
University of San Francisco, the co-author (along with Jacob Mundy)
of the illuminating book Western Sahara: War, Nationalism, and
Conflict Irresolution, says:

For those of us who have actually been to Western Sahara, there
is no question that it is an occupation. Any verbal or visual
expression of support for self-determination is savagely suppressed.
Even calls for social and economic justice can be dangerous. The
young sociologist Brahim Saika, a leader of a movement of unemployed
Sahrawi professionals demanding greater economic justice, was
tortured to death while in Moroccan detention in April 2016. Freedom
House has ranked Western Sahara as among the dozen least free nations
in the world, along with Tibet, Uzbekistan, North Korea, Saudi
Arabia, and Sudan. Indeed, of the more than 70 countries I have
visited — including Iraq under Saddam Hussein and Indonesia under
Suharto — Western Sahara is the most repressive police state I have
ever seen.

Morocco’s goodwill tour

Morocco’s readmission was reportedly influenced by Morocco’s
King Mohammad’s affluence. This became evident when he demonstrated
his largesse while touring the continent, lobbying for support from
African heads.

It is said he will now bankroll the AU in line with what Libya’s
Muammar Gaddafi used to do. The two are, of course, poles apart.
Gaddafi, arguably, had a pan-Africanist and anti-imperialist vision,
while the King aims at continued annexation of Western Sahara.

That is why prior to the AU vote the King embarked on a charm
offensive by touring African countries, seeking support for his AU
bid. In February 2014 he set off on a tour of Mali, Ivory Coast,
Guinea and Gabon. This was his second regional trip in less than five
months. He took with him a contingent of advisors and business
executives who negotiated a pile of agreements covering practically
everything – from religious training to agriculture and mining
projects.

In December 2016, the King concluded the second leg of a nearly
two-month, six-country Africa tour, resulting in some 50 bilateral
agreements. The visits came on the heels of trips to Rwanda,
Tanzania, and Senegal in October, when more than 40 bilateral
agreements were signed.

This is how the monarch wound up his whirlwind tour of Africa
prior to the AU Summit meeting in January 2017. For those who say the
royal expeditions to African countries had altruistic motive, suffice
it to quote his official who said:

Aside from west and central Africa we must open up to east Africa
and that is what is under way. The context of Morocco’s return to
the African Union is there too of course, and these are important
countries in the AU.

The tour of east Africa “is also a way to get closer to
countries which historically had positions which were hostile to
Morocco’s interests,” said the Moroccan source.

In some circles it is argued that Morocco’s readmission was a
‘positive’ step in that, as full member of the AU, it will now
have to recognize the independence and sovereignty of SADR. If that
is so then the readmission should have been conditional.

In any case, Morocco has no intention to give in on its
occupation. Its return to the union is intended to eventually push
for the removal of Western Sahara out of the AU, thus silencing the
voice of the Sahrawi people in connivance with ‘friendly’ member
states.

Yet while the AU fails to stand by such principles, the kingdom of
Morocco is under pressure in the international diplomatic arena where
Polisario is gaining global support. In fact, on 21 December 2016, a
few days before the Addis Ababa Summit, the European Court of Justice
(ECJ) dismissed Morocco’s claim to Western Sahara. The ruling means
the European Union’s trade deals with Morocco do not apply to the
occupied territory of Western Sahara which is endowed with its fish
stocks, mineral deposits, agricultural produce and oil reserves.

The UN and the European Union

The ECJ ruled that Western Sahara cannot be treated as a part of
Morocco, meaning no EU-Morocco trade deals can apply to the
territory. The ruling confirms the long-established legal status of
Western Sahara as a non-self-governing territory, and upholds
existing international law. The EU member states and institutions
have been asked to comply with the ruling and immediately cease all
agreements, funding and projects reinforcing Morocco’s illegal
occupation of Western Sahara.

Morocco had to accept that any free trade deal would have to exclude
Western Sahara

The Court also ruled that a trade deal between the EU and Morocco
should be scrapped because it included products from Western Sahara.
Morocco had to accept that any free trade deal would have to exclude
Western Sahara. This includes the fruits and vegetables grown by
companies such as Les Domaines Agricoles, which is partly owned by
King Mohammed VI.

On top of this there have been more than 100 UN resolutions
calling for self-determination for the Western Sahara. In March 2016,
the then UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon described the situation in
Western Sahara as an “occupation.” The UN, however, has to go
beyond rhetoric by enforcing its resolutions. It formally recognizes
the occupation of Western Sahara as illegal, and has maintained a
peacekeeping mission (MINURSO) commissioned to hold a referendum in
Sahara since 1991. But it has a skeleton staff, with no mandate to
even monitor human rights abuses, thanks to France’s Security
Council veto.

And so the French oil company Total is active in Western Sahara,
while others have pulled out. Also big investors such as the
Norwegian government’s pension fund avoid any deals which involve
Western Sahara. And the EFTA free trade association, a group of
non-EU countries including Norway, Switzerland, Iceland and
Liechtenstein, excludes Western Sahara goods from its free trade deal
with Morocco.

Morocco’s return to the AU is an affront not only to the people
of Western Sahara but to African people, for Morocco is a country
that once refused to host the African Cup of Nations on flimsy
grounds that Moroccans would be infected by African teams bringing in
Ebola virus.

Some African heads claim that the admission of Morocco will now
resolve the question of Western Sahara’s occupation. Such argument
is always pushed with some foreign machination. In fact Morocco is
now emboldened. That is why those who voted for readmission of
Morocco should have demanded an end to the illegal occupation as a
precondition.

That did not happen at the AU Summit meeting in Addis Ababa.
Instead we see the AU blatantly violating its own Constitutive Act,
and the principle for African countries to respect each other’s
territorial boundaries.

We witness a violation of both the AU and the UN declarations on
the inalienable right of the people of Western Sahara to independence
and self-determination.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Sahrawi people are
disenfranchized. It is estimated that up to 200,000 have fled to
refugee camps in the neighbouring Algeria and Mauritania. They are
separated by a 2,700km-long wall going through Western Sahara,
surrounded by landmines.