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FM calls on UN to set date for self-determination referendum

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Chahid Al Hafed (refugee camps), May 12,2015 (SPS) - The Minister of Foreign Affairs Mohamed Salem Ould Salek called on the United Nations to set a date for the referendum on the self-determination of Saharawi people in order to definitively end the Moroccan colonization.


“The Saharawi government will ask the UN Secretary General’s Personal Envoy for Western Sahara, Christopher Ross, to set a date for the referendum on Saharawi people’s self-determination with a view to ending the 40-year Moroccan colonization,” said Ould Salek in a statement to Algerian Press Service (APS).


The Minister said that this request will be made at the African Union Summit, which will take place in South Africa in June, adding that the Saharawi authorities “are ready to hold this referendum at any time.”


“Morocco has continuously hindered the holding of the UN referendum,” said Ould Salek, adding that “it tries to gain time and give some legitimacy to its colonization.”


He also denounced “the double standard policy of France, as a permanent member of the UN Security Council: it intervenes in some regions to impose the respect of human rights, while in Western Sahara, it supports the Moroccan occupier which is violating these rights.”


The Saharawi Foreign minister also called to extend the mandate of the UN Mission for Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) to include human rights monitoring in the occupied Saharawi territories.


Ould Salek underlined that the Saharawi people after 40 years of struggle “remain determined to exercise their legitimate right to self-determination and to regain their independence, in accordance with the UN resolutions,” adding that Western Sahara, the last colony in Africa, is recognized by 84 countries in the world. (SPS)


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