 By focusing its attention on the artificial conflict over the Sahara, in which it has already clearly lost points, Algeria seeks to divert attention from its own stagnation, says political scientist Sebastien Boussois.
"Algiers, which has many issues to deal with given the internal economic and social situation, seeks to divert attention from its own slump, focusing its attention and that of international observers on the conflict in the Sahara, in which it has already clearly lost points since Washington recognized the Sovereignty of the latter to Rabat, "said Sebastien Boussois, PhD in political science and researcher on the Middle East associated with the Université Libre de Bruxelles and UQAM (Montreal).
In an article published on the information website Le monde-arabe.fr, the geopolitical expert goes back over the origins and the stakes of the artificial conflict around the Sahara which "has lasted too long while the solutions are there, ready to hand", especially that of the autonomy proposed by Morocco.
The author of the analysis recalls that this plan is supported by the United States, noting that "Joe Biden, since his arrival at the White House, has not only not questioned the recognition of the Moroccan Sahara by his predecessor but has even qualified this plan as the only serious, credible and realistic initiative.
According to him, "the current conflict over the Western Sahara appears more and more in the eyes of history as a sham. It is not that of a non-country with rectilinear borders drawn by French and Spanish soldiers and whose populations occupied spaces that were largely unaware of these limits. It is the result, deferred in time, of a French colonial policy that subtracted territories from Moroccan sovereignty in order to achieve the great ambition of a vast ensemble linking French Algeria to the Atlantic and to the territories of French West Africa.
And, "since the past has produced so many chains that Algiers struggles to get rid of, it would be high time to return to the negotiating table and ratify a situation on the ground that is every day more than clear and obvious," he said.
The conflict in the so-called "Western Sahara" is an artificial conflict imposed on Morocco by Algeria. The Polisario, an armed separatist group supported by the Algerian government, claims the creation of a fake state in the Maghreb.
This situation is blocking all efforts by the international community to find a solution to this artificial conflict, based on advanced autonomy within a Moroccan sovereign framework and regional economic and security integration.
|