In a question recently addressed to the European executive, the German deputy said the European Parliament had already called on the EC to explain the steps it has taken to ensure that the European aid reaches the beneficiaries in Tindouf camps and that OLAF has actually investigated this issue and submitted a report.

    The EU deputy urged the European Commission to publish the findings of the OLAF report and shed light on the embezzled amounts. He also called on the EC to precisely specify the way it calculates the number of the beneficiaries of humanitarian aid.

    European sources in Brussels stated, in turn, that the European Commission has conducted this investigation following several reports of international NGOs and requests of EU MPs about embezzlements and mismanagement of humanitarian aids, including foodstuffs, which are sold in the Algerian market and Mauritania by Polisario leaders.

    The Polisario separatist movement has, since 1976, lured thousands of Sahrawis into joining it in the Tindouf camps where it continues to hold them against their will and lays claims over Morocco's southern provinces -the Sahara.

   Morocco and Polisario have so far held three rounds of negotiations in Manhasset (New York) under the auspices of the UN. A fourth round is due on March 11-13 in a bid to end Africa’s longest-running conflict over the Sahara. Morocco had, last year, proposed substantial autonomy to the region, an initiative that was widely commended as “serious” and “credible”.