Bir Lahlou (Liberated Territories), 4 October 2019 (SPS) - Foreign Minister of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) Mohamed Salem Ould Salek said that the United Nations Mission for the Holding of a Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) “must enjoy all its prerogatives and not to be subject to the influence or any control of the colonial administration,” affirming that “the Polisario Front will not tolerate any attempt to change its mission, consisting in organizing a referendum on self-determination.”
In a statement to the Sahrawi news agency SPS on SADR’s position following the adoption by the UN Security Council of its resolution 2494, Sahrawi Foreign Minister reiterated that “the commitment to respecting the ceasefire is related and subject to the commitment to holding a referendum on self-determination, in the sense that they constitute together the agreement which led to the setting up of the MINURSO, as an implementation mechanism,” he said.
“There are red lines mapped out with the martyrs’ blood and they are impassable, and he who dares it must face the Sahrawi people,” he warned, underscoring that the attempt to use the Security Council’s Authority to override the decision of the international legality relating to the issue of Western Sahara “is a desperate and deliberate attempt to cause unrest in the region so that to impose the selfish and colonial interests by the illegal occupation and fait accompli by the force of arms.”
For him “the blatant complicity with the illegal Moroccan occupation even inside the Security Council, notably France, which has, for three decades, hindered UN efforts, has reached its paroxysm with the recent attempts to change the MINURSO mission through the introduction of new formulations and terminology totally contrary to the letter and spirit of the two parties’ agreement, resolutions of the general Assembly and of Security Council, and to the decisions and provisions of the African Union (AU) and the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
“We affirm clearly and responsibly that neither France, nor Morocco, or any other side could seize the Sahrawi people’s right to self-determination and independence”, he said, especially as, he added, “three decades of prevarications and maneuvers to buy consciousness led to nothing.” (SPS)
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