London, April 11, 2014 (SPS) The UN Security Council must expand the mandate of its peacekeeping force in Western Sahara to include sustained human rights monitoring, said Amnesty International, amid clampdowns on peaceful protests and reports of activists tortured in custody during the past year, said Amnesty International in a statement Friday.
The statement indicated that in the year since the mandate was last renewed, the Moroccan authorities have continued to stifle dissent, placing restrictions on freedom of expression, peaceful protests and civil society. Peaceful demonstrations are routinely banned or violently dispersed. Amnesty International has documented cases of activists and protesters being tortured and otherwise ill-treated in police custody following demonstrations calling for MINURSO to adopt a human rights mandate in 2014.
The statement added that human rights defenders and activists in Western Sahara also face numerous restrictions on their work, including harassment and relentless surveillance by security forces, while authorities continue to obstruct the registration of local human rights associations,.
“If Morocco wishes to prove it is serious about respecting its international obligations, it must end the harassment or intimidation of activists and stop blocking independent human rights monitoring by both local groups and the UN,” said Salil Shetty, Amnesty International’s Secretary General.
Amnesty International recalled in its statement that given the political sensitivities surrounding the unresolved dispute over the territory annexed by Morocco in 1975, impartial and sustained monitoring by MINURSO could be crucial. On 8 November 2010, violence erupted as Moroccan security forces forcibly dismantled of a peaceful protest camp in Gdim Izik, near Laayoune, leaving 11 members of the Moroccan security forces and two Sahrawis dead. Moroccan authorities failed to independently and impartially investigate the events. Twenty-five Sahrawi civilians were later convicted by a military court for their alleged role in the violence and given heavy prison terms, including nine life sentences. The prisoners also spent two years in pre-trial detention during which they reported being tortured and otherwise ill-treated, before being unfairly convicted on the basis of forced “confessions”.
The statement highlited that an expanded MINURSO mandate could also help ensure an independent investigation is carried out into the deaths of 11 Sahrawis forcibly disappeared in 1976. Their remains were discovered and exhumed last year by an independent forensic team whose findings suggest the 11 were extrajudicially executed by Moroccan armed forces at the time.
“MINURSO could play a valuable role in preserving forensic evidence and paving the way for independent and impartial investigations into incidents such as enforced disappearances,” said Salil Shetty.
The UN Security Council is due to extend the mandate of the UN Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) at the end of April 2014. It is the only modern UN peacekeeping operation without a human rights component, Amnesty International reminded in its statement. (SPS)
062