Tunisian Ennahdha Denies its Chief Proposed Mediation between Rabat & Algiers

The Tunisian Islamist movement Ennahdha has flatly rejected reports that its leader Rached Ghannouchi had proposed his mediation in the diplomatic row opposing Morocco and Algeria, both tangled in a showdown over Algiers’s support for the Polisario separatist Front.

London-based Middle East Eye (MEE) in a May 8 article, citing an anonymous Algerian diplomatic source, pointed out that Ghannouchi approached Rabat and Algiers to help iron out their differences.

The Islamist leader contacted to this end Moroccan Premier Saad Eddine el-Othmani and the Algerian counterpart Ahmed Ouyahia, according to the media, which said that Ahmed Ouyahia told Ghannouchi there was no need for such a mediation and that Morocco should “stop the propaganda” against Algiers.

Speaking to HuffPost Tunisie, the Head of the office of the Tunisian Islamist movement Presidency, Fawzi Kammoun lambasted MEE’s article noting that the party does not interfere in other countries’ internal affairs.

“We reject it categorically,” Kammoun said.

Tensions have recently flared up between Morocco and Algiers over what Rabat called violation of ceasefire agreement by the Algeria-backed Polisario, which illegally intruded in the buffer zone town of Al Mahbes.

Rabat referred the April violation to the UN and called on Algiers to rein in its protégé.

Rabat also announced on May 1 it was cutting off ties with Tehran over its support for the separatist group via its Lebanon-based Shia proxy movement Hezbollah.

Moroccan authorities said they have undisputable evidence that Hezbollah delivered, through the Iranian embassy in Algiers, weapons to the Polisario and dispatched its military experts to Tindouf to train the Front’s militia to urban warfare.

Several countries, including the members of the Arab League, the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) backed Morocco’s decision, leaving Algeria isolated.