Occupied El-Aaiun, 18 November 2025 (SPS) – The Collective of Sahrawi Human Rights Defenders in Western Sahara (CODESA) has issued a new report documenting the grave crimes and violations committed by the Moroccan occupation against Sahrawi civilians over a period of 50 years.
According to the report, issued on the occasion of 50 years of Moroccan occupation of Western Sahara and covering the period from 31 October 1975 to 31 October 2025, the number of crimes committed by the occupation has reached 38,041.
These include 317 extrajudicial executions, 13 people who died as a result of death sentences, 390 long-term enforced disappearances, 8,506 cases of harm to physical integrity and personal safety, 4,565 short-term abductions, 1,242 political arrests, 8,100 cases of forced displacement of Sahrawi youth, 636 landmine victims, 837 cases of foreign observers being prevented from monitoring, 1,241 violations of the right to freedom of movement, 9,806 home raids and destruction of property.
The report is titled “Western Sahara: The Last Test of the Credibility of the United Nations System,” referring to the continued failure of the UN system to implement UN resolutions and international law, despite the presence of MINURSO since 1991 with the mandate to conduct a referendum guaranteeing the Sahrawi people’s right to self-determination.
The report also documents the ongoing torture, ill-treatment, and arbitrary detention of Sahrawi political prisoners in Moroccan prisons, in blatant violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention and various relevant international treaties and covenants.
It further highlights the Moroccan occupying state’s systematic discrimination against Sahrawi civilians, the confiscation of their economic, social and cultural rights, and the continued plundering of natural resources in collusion with foreign companies, despite rulings by the Court of Justice of the European Union affirming the illegality of exploiting these resources without the consent of the Sahrawi people through their legitimate representative, the Polisario Front.
The report also addresses the growing and intensified settlement policy in the occupied Western Sahara, and the ongoing suffering of Sahrawi civilians due to the widespread landmines planted by the Moroccan occupying forces, causing harm to the environment, to Sahrawis, and to their property.
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