New York (United Nations), 15 September 2023 (SPS) - The President of the Republic, Secretary General of the Polisario Front, Brahim Ghali, held a meeting with the Personal Envoy of the UN Secretary General for Western Sahara Staffan de Mistura who committed to continuing his efforts to further the peace process as part of the implementation of the UN resolutions, in order to enable the Sahrawi people to exercise their right to self-determination.
Held on Monday in New York, the meeting was about the latest developments of the peace process under the aegis of the United Nations for the decolonization of Western Sahara, by focusing on the personal envoy’s efforts, notably the visit he paid last week to the occupied territories of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR).
In this regard, De Mistura made a presentation on his visits to the occupied El Aaiun and Dakhla. The visit came after two years of waiting because of the hindrances imposed by the Moroccan occupier.
In this regard, De Mistura said he is determined to “continue his efforts and contacts to further the peace process in Western Sahara as part of the implementation of the UN resolutions in order to enable the Sahrawi people to exercise their right to self-determination”.
Dubbing “normal” the visit, the President of the Republic underlined that it is part of “the mission and responsibility of the United Nations,” adding that it shouldn’t be an end in itself, nor a favor granted by the occupier State.”
Ghali underlined the acts of repression and violence committed against the Sahrawi civilians, preventing them from exercising their right to demonstrations in order to express their positions.
He stressed the necessity “for the United Nations to assume its responsibility, to ensure that the international law and the international humanitarian law are upheld in Western Sahara, to protect the defenseless Sahrawi citizens and stop the serious violations committed against them by the Moroccan occupation State, while putting an end to the plundering the Sahrawi natural resources and releasing immediately all the war prisoners and the Sahrawi civilians in the Moroccan jails.”
After expressing the Sahrawi side’s willingness to cooperate with the United Nations in its efforts to eradicate colonialism in Africa’s last colony and enable the Sahrawi people to exercise their inalienable right to self-determination and independence, President Ghali emphasized the Sahrawi people’s commitment “to defending their national rights and aspirations by all legal means enshrined by the UN Charter and AU’s constitutive Act.”
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