"The Council has before it an alternative option that in my view is the optimal solution: adopt the autonomy plan proposed by Morocco," Ould Souilem was quoted as saying in a tribune entitled "Time to return to Morocco."

   By adopting Morocco's autonomy initiative for its southern provinces, the Sahara, "the Council would end the misery of my people in the camps and give separated families a chance to reunite," he said, denouncing the lack of basic living conditions in the camps.

    Touching on the increasing number of groups who have fled torture in Tindouf camps to join their homeland Morocco, Ould Souilem said that "these people would prefer to risk death under the unforgiving sun of the Sahara rather than remain in the Polisario-controlled camps in southern Algeria".

     "For more than 30 years, tens of thousands of Sahrawis in the Tindouf camps have been separated from their families in Morocco and deprived of basic human rights and freedoms," Oul Souilem added.

    The former polisario leader made it clear that his decision to join Morocco stemmed from "deep conviction and profound belief that the time has come for the unnecessary conflict in the Western Sahara to end" and "for Algeria to cease its destructive meddling in our affairs."

    He explained that for 34 years the polisario and their mentor Algeria have used the population held against their will in the camps as "pawns in a geopolitical game that distorts reality".

    The polisario refuses to take a head count of the population in the camps, and continue to deny them the freedom of movement outside the camps, Ould Souilem said.

    Sahrawis held in the camps "can’t vote, or even find work to improve their own lives," when their brothers in their homeland Morocco "live in a healthy economy with a broad range of services and protections," he said.

Source: MAP
News and events concerning Western Sahara issue/ Corcas