"The Security Council resolutions are clear, and the efforts of Morocco were hailed as pertinent and serious," the Minister told the press at the end of the 3rd round of negotiations on the Sahara held between Morocco and the Algerian-backed Polisario separatists, in the presence of neighboring Algeria and Mauritania.
Recalling that the security council has called for negotiations that take into account the efforts made by Morocco, the official deplored that the other parties "are taking too much time to understand this signal," hoping that the fourth round of talks, slated for March 11-13, would bring about some change in attitudes.
“We will try to explain to the Special Envoy [of the UN Secretary General] that Morocco has made a great step, and we expect the other party to do as well,” Mr. Fihri told the press, noting that the Moroccan delegation will go to Manhasset IV to “explain the Moroccan proposal, and to explain the frame in which we work, that is autonomy, and nothing but autonomy, in keeping with the international norms, with the security council resolutions and with the international legality.”
Morocco awaits with interest the visit of the UNSG Special Envoy, Mr. Van Walsum, in order to “shift gears” and “to reach a solution” to the Sahara issue, he said, deploring that “what prevents us from reaching a solution as soon as possible is the Polisario’s clinging to a rigid and backward-looking position, which does not take into consideration the accumulated experiences, and the consequences that we have drawn from the past proposals that served neither peace nor security.”
The Sahara dispute broke out in 1976 when the Polisario separatists, backed by neighboring Algeria, laid claims to the Sahara, a former Spanish colony that was ceded to Morocco a year earlier under the Madrid Accord.
The Foreign Minister also recalled that Morocco has accepted to receive UN human rights experts, and to allow them to move freely in the country and contact the authorities and the civil society, deploring that no such moves are taken in Tindouf (soutnwestern Algeria) or in Algiers.