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Sahara: 8th round of informal talks continues with the participation of all parties
7/20/2011

The delegations of the parties to informal talks on the Sahara continue their talks Wednesday, at the eighth round, which runs from 19 to 21 July at the invitation of the Personal Envoy of the Secretary General of the UN, Christopher Ross.

The Moroccan delegation to the eighth set of informal talks on the Sahara (July 19-21) arrived on Tuesday.

The talks will be held upon the invitation of UNSG's personal envoy Christopher Ross, to Manhasset (New York's suburbs).

The delegation is composed of Foreign Minister Taïb Fassi Fihri, Director General of intelligence agency (DGED) Mohamed Yassine Mansouri, and Secretary General of the Royal Advisory Council for Saharan Affairs (CORCAS) Maouelainin Benkhalihanna Maouelainin.

In addition to Morocco, this new set of informal talks will bring together Algeria, Mauritania and the polisario.

The talks, opened in August 2009 in Austria, to prepare the ground for the 5th round of formal negotiations aiming at finding a lasting political solution to the regional dispute over the Sahara.

The informal talks are part of implementing the Security Council resolutions 1813 (2008), 1871 (2009), 1920 (2010) and 1979 (2011), which call on the parties to enter into a more intensive and substantive phase of negotiations.

The seven previous rounds were held successively in August 2009 in the Austrian locality of Durnstein (near Vienna), in February 2010 in Armonk (near New York), in November, December and January in Manhasset, last March in Malta and last June in Manhasset.

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