UN/Sahara: 4th Committee reiterates support for UN political process, reaffirms burial of referendum
The Fourth Committee of the UN General Assembly adopted, on Wednesday, a resolution reiterating its support for the political process carried out under the exclusive auspices of the United Nations for the settlement of the regional dispute over the Moroccan Sahara and reaffirming the final burial of the referendum.
The resolution calls on all parties to fully cooperate with the UN Secretary-General and his Personal Envoy to achieve a political solution to this regional dispute on the basis of resolutions adopted by the Security Council since 2007. It thus supports the political process based on the 19 Security Council resolutions since 2007, with a view to achieving a “just, lasting and mutually acceptable political” solution to the Moroccan Sahara issue.
The text commends efforts in this direction and calls on all parties to cooperate fully with the Secretary-General, and with each other, to achieve a “mutually acceptable political solution.”
This resolution, like the Committee’s previous ones and those adopted by the Security Council over the past two decades, at no time cites the referendum, dead and buried by both the UN Secretary-General and the General Assembly and the Security Council.
The UN General Assembly also welcomes in this resolution that the parties have committed to continue to display political will and to work in an atmosphere conducive to dialogue, based on the efforts made and the developments that have occurred since 2006, thus ensuring the implementation of Security Council resolutions since 2007.
It should be noted that the only new development that has occurred in the political process since 2006 is the presentation by Morocco on April 11, 2007 of the Autonomy initiative.
In this regard, the resolution supports the Security Council resolutions since 2007, which have established the pre-eminence of the Autonomy plan presented by Morocco, hailed by the Executive Body and the entire international community as being a serious and credible initiative for the definitive settlement of this regional dispute within the framework of the Kingdom’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
The text also supports the recommendations of resolutions 2440, 2468, 2494, 2548, 2602 and those of the latest resolution 2654, adopted at the end of October 2022. All these resolutions determine the parameters of the solution to the regional dispute over the Moroccan Sahara: a political, realistic, pragmatic solution that is sustainable and based on compromise.
Resolutions 2440, 2468, 2494, 2548, 2602 and 2654 reaffirmed the round table process and defined, once and for all, its four participants, namely Morocco, Algeria, Mauritania and the “Polisario”. Indeed, resolutions 2440, 2468, 2494, 2548, 2602 and 2654 cite Algeria, in the same way as Morocco, five times, thus reaffirming Algeria’s role as the main party to this regional dispute.
These Security Council resolutions also welcome the measures and initiatives taken by Morocco for the promotion and protection of human rights in its southern provinces, and the role played by the Commissions of the National Rights Council of Human Rights in Laâyoune and Dakhla, as well as Morocco’s interaction with the mechanisms of the United Nations Human Rights Council.
They also reiterate the request of the UN executive body for the registration and census of the populations of the Tindouf camps, and demand the deployment of the necessary efforts to this end.
The present resolution of the 4th committee of the General Assembly in no way refers to a so-called imaginary war that Algeria and its puppet the “Polisario” claim to exist in the Moroccan Sahara. Thus, after the Security Council, the committee in turn exposes the lies and false allegations by Algeria and the “Polisario” regarding the situation in the Moroccan Sahara where stability and peace and all-round development prevail.
