"The UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon is pleased that the parties have agreed to the proposal made by his Personal Envoy, Christopher Ross, that the next set of informal talks on the Sahara be held on February 10-11," UNSG Spokesperson Farhan Haq said in a press briefing.

    This meeting will take place in Westchester County, in the outskirts of New York, and will be based on the guidance provided by Security Council resolution 1871 (2009) and earlier resolutions, he added.

    "Ban Ki-moon encourages the parties to make further progress and urges focused and productive discussions," he said.

    The first set of informal talks in preparation for the fifth round of negotiations was held in August 2009 in Austria, in implementation of the Security Council Resolution 1871, and brought together delegations from Morocco, Algeria, Mauritania, and the Polisario.

    Since June 2007, four rounds of negotiations were held in Manhasset (New York outskirts), a process triggered by the Moroccan autonomy initiative for the Sahara region.

 Source : MAP
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