Geneva, 18 October 2024 (SPS) - Algeria's Permanent Representative to the United Nations Office and international organizations in Geneva, Rachid Bladehane rejected in “clear and unequivocal” terms Morocco's blackmail of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and other humanitarian agencies, denouncing the “fallacious and unfounded” arguments used by this country to block the work of this UN organization and “accuse” Algeria.
“I take the floor, once again, to remind this honorable audience that Morocco unfortunately continues, as usual, to use fallacious and unfounded arguments to both block the work of the UNHCR and, above all, accuse my country, whose only fault is to support international legality and shelter refugees fleeing death and persecution,” he stressed during the vote on the UN agency's budget for 2025.
In this regard, he affirmed that Algeria “rejects, in clear and unequivocal terms, the blackmail exercised by Morocco on the UNHCR and other humanitarian agencies, including the WFP (World Food Program).”
“All the delegates present here have noted that the accusations made by Morocco have nothing to do with the budget,” he continued.
Algeria's representative to the United Nations Office and international organizations in Geneva wondered “why this country, which claims the ‘Moroccan-ness’ of the Western Sahara and its people, is doing everything it can to strangle this population, chased from its territory and which has found refuge in Algeria, by depriving it of the aid and assistance of the UNHCR and other humanitarian agencies, assistance which it needs like all the other refugees in the world.”
“Needless to say, this attitude of defiance, deliberately obstructive to the work of the UNHCR, jeopardizes the entire action of this honorable institution in the service of 123 million refugees and displaced persons, the majority of whom are in Africa,” he warned.
Reiterating Algeria's support for and confidence in the UNHCR, Ambassador Bladehane recalled that “all the documents drawn up obey international legality and will continue to do so in the future.”
“Based on this, Algeria has voted in favor of adopting the budget by consensus, as has been the case in all previous years, and it is also for all these reasons that it will vote in favor of this same budget designed to alleviate the suffering of millions of refugees and displaced persons around the world,” continued the Algerian diplomat.
He assured that Algeria “will also ensure that respect for the language used by the United Nations is guaranteed,” stressing that it “will not accept, under any circumstances, any modification based on arbitrary politicization and the holding hostage of the eminently humanitarian action of the UNHCR.”