Skip to main content

Polisario Representative to New Zealand: “Stop New Zealand’s role in controversial phosphate trade”

Submitted on

Hawkes Bay (New Zealand) 26 August 2019 (SPS)- Polisario Front's Representative to Australia and New Zealance, Mr. Kamal Fadel, called for the end of New Zealand's companies role in collaborating with Morocco in the plunder of Saharawi phosphate, in an opinion published Today in New Zealand Herald.
Here is the complete text of the article:
By: Kamal Fadel
A vessel named Amoy Dream carrying about 55000 tonnes of phosphate rock from Western Sahara is expected to arrive at Napier Port today.
Seventy per cent of all New Zealand’s phosphate comes from Western Sahara, occupied by Morocco since 1975. It has, since then, been a shameful blot on the landscape of global justice and human rights.
Legal opinion is mounting that Morocco’s exploitation of Sahrawi resources, and the subsequent import of those resources, is illegal.
The kingdom of Morocco has cadged and manoeuvred nimbly since a United Nations-brokered ceasefire in 1991, to ensure much is said but also that the awful status quo remains unchanged.
UN resolutions come and go, confirming the right of Sahrawis to self-determination and countless official admonitions emerge and fade away like mirages in the harsh Sahara sun.
More than 80 countries recognise Western Sahara as an independent entity and it is a member of the African Union, while no country recognises Morocco’s occupation of Western Sahara.
Morocco’s deft lobbying has ensured Western Sahara remains mired in economic backwardness, and has ensured its people are continually, and often violently, deprived of their basic liberties and freedoms.
More than 173,000 Sahrawis refugees remain stranded in the desert, victims of Morocco’s strong-arm tactics. Many haven’t been able to go home for about four decades.
Despite it all, the world, it seems, has learned how to ignore Western Sahara. But not the super-phosphate industry. It has been busy pumping funds straight into the pockets of the fabulously wealthy Moroccan royal family and depriving impoverished Sahrawis of their rightful return on resources extracted from beneath their very feet.
Increased demand for fertilisers in an era of increased concerns about food security and with raising yields combined with no new capacity has ensured Western Saharan phosphate trades at a premium on the world stage.
Phosphate is thus a major trade asset for Morocco and represents a form of theft from the Sahrawi, many of whom languish in refugee camps on the Algerian border while the rest live in poverty in the occupied areas.
New Zealand companies argue that their imports of phosphate rock to New Zealand are in full compliance with international law, including UN provisions for trade with non-self-governing territories.
In 2002, the UN’s senior legal officer, Hans Corell, determined that the exploitation of Western Sahara natural resources in disregard of the interests of the people of Western Sahara would violate international legal principles related to non-self-governing territories.
The Court of Justice of the European Union (the CJEU) affirmed on three occasions (December 2016 and February and July 2018) that Morocco has no sovereignty over Western Sahara and its maritime space.
In May 2017, the Sahrawi authorities successfully applied to the South Africa High Court to detain a vessel carrying a cargo of phosphates en route to New Zealand. The court subsequently ruled that the Sahrawi authorities (and people) were the rightful owners of the cargo and that Morocco was not entitled to trade in Western Sahara resources.
Another argument that is often advanced by New Zealand companies is that the local Moroccan company Phosbucraa is helping the local population with employment and investment. This is not true because despite the substantial income received from Western Sahara natural resources, the overwhelming majority of Sahrawis still live in dire poverty.
Phosbucraa is a Moroccan state-owned company. All the revenue earned by it is paid into the Moroccan treasury and is used at the regime’s discretion.
The Moroccan phosphate mining and processing industry is captive to the Moroccan absolute monarch and his generals who benefit, not the local Sahrawi population.

New Zealand has time and again expressed support to the UN peace process in Western Sahara including the holding of a genuine act of self-determination by the Sahrawi people.
Yet this is a contradiction when New Zealand companies, in direct contravention of basic international law and convention, are allowed to trade with an illegally occupied region under a UN self-determination mandate.
In Australia, Canada, the United States and Scandinavia companies have already bailed on the sector and have dumped shares in companies involved in the illegal trade. Shareholders in New Zealand might wonder about facing the same fate.
Ravensdown and Ballance should actively consider alternative sources and invest in equipment that enables them to broaden their supply options with a view to ending the illegal importing from Western Sahara. This is possible and not expensive but requires good will and leadership from the company’s management.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern displayed extraordinary leadership and courage during the Christchurch massacre. We are hopeful the Prime Minister will show the same resolve to stop the phosphate trade which is damaging New Zealand’s good reputation and standing in the world.
Kamal Fadel is the Australia and New Zealand representative for Polisario, the United Nations-recognised independence movement for Western Sahara
Source: New Zealand Herald
090/500/60 (SPS)