Rome, Jan 4, 2022 (SPS) -The Communist Refoundation Party in Italy called on the government of its country to put pressure on Morocco to bring it to comply with "the obligation to protect the Sahrawi activist" Sultana Khaya, under house arrest since November 2020 , and who continues to "suffer several repeated abuses".
The Communist Refoundation Party "considers necessary and a priority the strong and immediate intervention of the central government, in order to put pressure, at the institutional and international levels, on the government and the Moroccan monarchy in order to ensure that the obligation to protect the Sahrawi activist, sick and harassed, be respected, as also requested by the UN representative ".
In a statement published on his website, he recalled that "Sultana Khaya has been under house arrest since November 2020, a period during which, among others, as reported by Amnesty International (AI) and the United Nations special rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, she has suffered several repeated abuses ".
Among these heinous abuses, reported by AI, the Communist Refoundation Party reports that "it is also necessary to mention the fact that she, her sisters and her mother over 80 years old were raped by the Moroccan security forces".
At the end of December 2020, the United Nations special rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, Mary Lawlor, stressed that the Moroccan authorities "have an obligation to protect" the Sahrawi activist Sultana Khaya who continues to be the subject of intimidation, torture, rape, threats and inhumane practices.
"Sultana Khaya appears to be in serious danger, her health is deteriorating and is vulnerable to further attacks. The Moroccan authorities have an obligation to protect her," she said.
Reiterating, moreover, its friendship and its proximity with the Saharawi and Moroccan peoples, the Communist-European Left Refoundation Party "invites the various local authorities to approve agendas of solidarity with Sultana Khaya and her struggle in favor of the people of the Western Sahara ".
"The unresolved question of the self-determination of the Saharawi people and respect for the human rights of its citizens is again topical these days, especially after (...) the intervention of the UN" , points out the Italian party.
"This is a question linked to Western Sahara and to the violence perpetrated by the Moroccan security forces against the Saharawi militants who find in the story of Sultana Khaya a kind of paradigm of the violent and authoritarian models deployed by the repressive apparatus of the Moroccan state and government ", one explained, noting that over time," the Sahrawi activist has become, perhaps in spite of herself, the symbol of the struggle of an entire people ".
Sultana Khaya is president of the Sahrawi League for the Defense of Human Rights and against the plundering of natural resources in occupied Boudjdour, north of Western Sahara.
“Over time, she lost one eye when she was attacked by police at the University of Marrakech, followed by several assaults on her and her family members, and this only because she asked and always calls for respect for human rights, "also recalls Maurizio Acerbo's party.SPS
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