Shaheed El Hafed, 13 May 2026 (SPS) – The Ministry of National Defence officially announced on Wednesday the establishment of the Sahrawi Military Office for Monitoring Compliance with International Humanitarian Law.
The announcement ceremony took place during a press conference chaired by the Chief of the General Staff of the Sahrawi People’s Liberation Army, member of the National Secretariat, Hamma Salama, in the presence of the Special Adviser to the President of the Republic in charge of Natural Resources and Related Legal Issues, Ambassador Oubi Bouchraya Bachir; the Deputy Chief of the Army General Staff, Taleb Ami Deih; the official in charge of military and security affairs at the Presidency of the Republic, Cherif Bousif; as well as officials from national institutions concerned with international law.
In his speech on the occasion, Hamma Salama pointed out that the Polisario Front’s announcement of the establishment of the Sahrawi Military Office for Monitoring Compliance with International Law is in line with the provisions of international law governing the Sahrawi people’s legitimate struggle for self-determination and independence, particularly United Nations General Assembly Resolution 1514 of 1960, which affirmed that the subjection of peoples to colonial and foreign domination is contrary to the Charter of the United Nations. He also referred to General Assembly Resolution 2625 of 1970, which granted peoples under foreign domination the right to struggle for self-determination, and General Assembly Resolution 3070 of 1973, which affirmed the legitimacy of the struggle of peoples under colonial domination and foreign occupation by all means, including armed struggle.
He added that the initiative is also consistent with the provisions of international humanitarian law, especially the 1949 Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocol I of 1977, which grants fighters of national liberation movements a specific legal status under international humanitarian law. The Polisario Front had acceded to this protocol and deposited its instrument of commitment with the Swiss Federal Council in June 2015.
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