Polisario Front denies it targeted civilians in W.Sahara

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Polisario Front denies it targeted civilians in W.Sahara

8:51 CAT | 31 Oct 2023

FILE - For illustration purposes only. Polisario fighters gather outside the refugee camp of Dakhla, which lies some 170km to the southeast of the Algerian city of Tindouf, January 14, 2023. [File photo: AFP]

A Polisario Front representative said on Monday that the pro-independence movement had never targeted civilians, but acknowledged military action in an area of Western Sahara where explosions left one person dead and several wounded over the weekend.

The Moroccan public prosecutor’s office announced on Sunday the opening of an investigation after “projectile fire” killed one person dead and injured three, two of them seriously, on Saturday night in Smara, in the disputed territory of Western Sahara.

“We are not accusing anyone because we are simply awaiting the conclusive results of this investigation,” Moroccan ambassador to the UN Omar Hilale told reporters on Monday.

“But we can’t ignore the fact that there are a number of equally convincing clues,” he added, noting in particular that the Polisario Front’s lack of denial, “its silence, confirms that it is the one that is behind” the shooting.

Asked about the incident, the Polisario Front’s UN representative Sidi Omar referred to a military communique from the movement acknowledging that it had targeted “the Smara, Mahbas and Farsia sectors.”

“It is not the first time… We are in open war,” he added.

On November 13, 2020, the Polisario Front declared that it was “in a state of self-defense war” and warned the international community that the whole of Western Sahara was considered a war zone by the pro-independence organization.

But “the Polisario Front, based on its values and full compliance with the rules of international humanitarian law, has never targeted any civilians in its war of liberation against Morocco,” Sidi Omar said. “We challenge anyone to prove the contrary.”

These statements came against the backdrop of Monday’s adoption by the UN Security Council of a resolution renewing the mandate of the UN peacekeeping mission in Western Sahara (Minurso) for a further year.

The resolution, adopted with 13 votes in favor and two abstentions (Russia and Mozambique), also welcomed the “efforts” made to relaunch the process by Staffan de Mistura, the UN Secretary-General’s personal envoy.

For decades, the question of this former Spanish colony has pitted Morocco – which controls 80 percent of the territory and is proposing an autonomy plan under its sovereignty – against the Sahrawi independence fighters of the Polisario Front, supported by Algiers.

In the absence of a final settlement, Western Sahara is considered a “non-self-governing territory” by the UN.

Source: AFP