Skip to main content

Moroccan repression: Protection of unarmed Sahrawis required

Submitted on

Boumerdes (Algeria), 29 July 2019 (SPS) -Sahrawi Prime Minister Mohamed Wali Akeik called Saturday, in Boumerdes (50-km east of Algiers), on the UN Security Council and the UN Secretary-General to "assume full responsibility" in the protection of disarmed Sahrawi people, facing Moroccan repression.
Sahrawi people are subject to "a real policy of repression practiced by the Moroccan occupation regime, accompanied by an unfair media campaign, an intense blockade against Sahrawis, a confiscation of freedoms and a looting of natural resources," said the Sahrawi Prime Minister at the opening of the 10th edition of the Summer University of the executives of the Polisario Front and the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR).
In the face of these repressive practices, we call, today and more than ever, for the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) to be allowed to exercise its proper role in protecting, monitoring and reporting on human rights and not to turn a blind eye to the criminal acts perpetrated by the Moroccan occupation regime in the region,” said the Sahrawi minister.
In this context, he urged the United Nations to "accelerate the implementation of its commitments, allowing the Sahrawis to choose their future and enjoy their right to self-determination through a free, fair and regular referendum.”
He also stressed the need "to act, as a matter of urgency, to release all Sahrawi political detainees in Moroccan jails, including those of the July 19, 2019 uprising, the heroes of the epic "Gdeim Izik," students and all other Sahrawi political prisoners." (SPS)
062/SPS/APS