Human Rights

Western Sahara human rights activist Aminatou Haidar will be receiving the Robert F Kennedy Human Rights Award today at a ceremony in Washington D.C.

“For me, as an individual, the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights award represents a great honor. As a Sahrawi human rights activist, I consider it recognition that the cause of the Sahrawi people is just and legitimate and that our non-violent resistance is noble and righteous, in spite of the risks and the intimidation of the Moroccan authorities,” said Aminatou Haidar. “The Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award will provide constructive support to the struggle of the Sahrawi people for liberty and human dignity.”

As you read through the United Nations Resolution 1514(XV) you begin to get a feel of its prose, of its ideals, and the people who put it to paper and for all those who benefit and have yet to benefit.  This was in 1960, an era of European decolonization and where nations, particularly in Africa, came into being.

The resolution is more than just a declaration on the granting of independence colonial countries and peoples, it is an affirmation of fundamental rights and a pillar in the UN Charter.  And yet these rights, the right to self-determination, the right to dignity and the promotion of social progress, is being flaunted by Morocco in the Western Sahara.  It is being flaunted by the Security Council as well as several prominent European nations. And the world remains silent.

Resolution 1514 addresses seven features that the Saharwi people have been struggling to achieve. I will briefly elaborate on the first.

1. The subjection of peoples to alien subjugation, domination and exploitation constitutes a denial of fundamental human rights, is contrary to the Charter of the United Nations and is an impediment to the promotion of world peace and co-operation.

Alien subjugation and domination -

When Spain withdrew its colonial rule over the Western Sahara, both Morocco and Mauritania laid claim to this vast area of desert, home to indigenous peoples known as the Saharwi.   Both Morocco and Mauritania took their claims to the International Court of Justice in 1974.  But in October 1975, the ICJ rules against the claims in favor of self-determination.  King Hassan II of Morocco then sends in 350,000 Moroccans into the disputed territory.  The Western Sahara had once again been colonized.

Exploitation

Today the situation has hardly progressed.  The Saharwi are marginalized and those who continue to push for self-determination are subject to harassment and jail. The Association of the Saharwi Unemployed says Moroccans account for nearly 90% of available jobs (Shelley, 2004).

50,000 Saharwi live in slums near Laayoune with no running water and no electricity (ibid). In the meantime, the European Union is set to sign the ‘Advanced Status’ to Morocco, a trade agreement that will include the Western Sahara.  The accord provides preferential treatment and opens up a “common economic space.”

However, the exploitation of natural resources in the Western Sahara is a violation of international customary law.  Morocco’s annexation of the Western Sahara is not a forgone conclusion. The United States signed a similar contract but specifically excluded the Western Sahara. The EU should do the same.

Shelley, T. (2004) “Endgame in the Western Sahara.” Zed books. London and New York.

It’s the final day of the 34th EUCOCO conference and people are slowly filing into the conference hall at El Palau de la Música in Valencia, Spain.  It is an appropriate setting for this finale where the dramas of injustice, oppression, and conviction play out on the stage in its many halls.  Except this time, the dramas have been lived and experienced by those present.

They are tangible in the faces of those who have been traumatized and left scarred.  Dramas that line the faces of Enaama Asfari who was tied to a tree and beaten unconscious by Moroccan police in April.  Lines that address the curves of the young Sultana Khaya who lost an eye while demonstrating for Saharwi self-determination at the University of Marrakesh last year.

And while delegates all around the world have come to declare their support, I cannot help but feel somewhat unsettled at the prospect of another thirty years of a status quo.  The Polisario, along with Morocco, Algeria and the United Nations have vested interests in maintaining this status quo. A disturbing situation that aggravates the already harsh living conditions of the common Saharwi.

In the meantime, the civil solidarity movement, while vibrant, is fragmented.  There is a lack of coordination between the human rights activists in the occupied territories and the Polisario who are oddly withdrawn. Morocco has had a hand in this as well.  They have silenced voices and with the aid of France, have blocked the 2006 UNHCHR from publishing the following phrase:

“The right to self-determination for the people of Western Sahara must be ensured and implemented without any further delay…almost all human rights violations and concerns with regard to the people of Western Sahara…stem from the non implementation of this fundamental human right…”

The UN established MINURSO in 1991 with a mandate to monitor a ceasefire and organize and establish a referendum for self-determination.  To date, MINURSO is only UN mission that has no human rights office.  The Saharwi want to expand MINURSOs mandate to include the human rights office and allow in observers.  Efforts in the United Nations are, however, underway to maintain some focus in the Western Sahara.

Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the World Organization Against Torture…, have all documented cases of human rights abuse in the Western Sahara.  This includes torture, kidnapping, arbitrary detention, unfair trials, ill treatment of children and minors, right to assembly, and the disappearance of some 500 Saharwi civilians.

written November 9

Next blog entry - the victims

The International Crisis Group calls it one of the world’s longest and most neglected conflicts.

For the Saharwi who live in the Western Sahara in southern Morocco, everyday is a struggle for recognition of basic fundamental rights and international attention. Neither seem to materialize.  Progress is slow but for the global solidarity movement represented here in  EUCOCO, each step sets in motion a hope for justice.

Aminatour Haidar won the RFK Human Rights Award, the United Nations High Commission For Human Rights is fully informed as isJudge Baltasar Garzon. In the territories, thousands continue to live in fear, in oppression, under a kingdom that denies access to foreign media and will imprison those who are seen to oppose Rabat.

I’ve heard of terrible stories involving torture, rape, forced abortions, and a constant pressure by Morocco on the Saharwi people.

With these sobering thoughts I attended the Human Rights and Occupied Territories workshop where the Polisario, representatives from NGOs, human rights and international law attorneys discussed the steps needed to liberate political prisoners detained by the Moroccan state, a task that will fall upon CODESA, CODAPSA, ASVDH and AFAPREDESA to coordinate.

The Saharwi want to expand the UN mandate in the Western Sahara. This involves establishing a human rights bureau within the framework of the UN High Commission of Human Rights and allowing observers into the territories.  But the challenges are numerous.

Permanent Security Council member France has blocked the official 2006 UNHCR report which documents human rights abuses committed by the Moroccan state against the Saharwi. And there is no reason, aside from infringing international law, that it should change its mind.

The movement has no full time paid lawyer and there is a logistic disconnect between the civil solidarity movement, NGOs, international organizations states and human rights activists. This includes the Polisario who have yet to coordinate a plan of action said Brahim Dahane, president of the banned ASVDH human rights organization in Morocco.

Mansur Omar, Polisario representative of France, said activists and NGOs need training in human rights and international law and more needs to be done to organize international organizations and governments with SADR.  «We must find a way to send lawyers to defend Saharwi in Moroccan courts, » said Omar.

Human rights strategies in the occupied territories also involves getting the Spanish government to support human rights organizations in Western Sahara.  It is hoped that Madrid will pressure Morocco into opening the territories for activists, NGOs, and the Saharwi.

But officially, the Spanish government no longer recognizes SADR nor its claim on the Western Sahara. Spain, along with several other EU countries, have instead signed lucrative fishing contracts with Rabat off the disputed coastline.  So far, only Sweden has officially denounced the plunder of these natural resources. Among those are phosphates Morocco operates a major phosphate mine in Boucraa.

« The question of human rights is the only instrument we have in our political combat in the occupied territories « said Saharwi human rights activist activist Ennaama Asfari. « We need to work close with all human rights committees in the United Nations and present them with all the testimonies,« he added.

Sahawri who are detained and arbitrarily arrested have no impartial legal representation.    Efforts are underway to release these political prisoners, in particular, Yaha Mohamed Elhafad Iaaza who was arrested this year in Tan-Tan and sentenced to 15 years.

But more needs to be addressed for the struggle of women who face discrimination as well as human rights abuses by Moroccan authorities. «Even if we speak the same message we are not getting the same attention, » said Zahra Ahmed, president of the association of Saharwi women.

Plans include getting the UN to create a human rights special rappateur for the Western Sahara and establish a bureau within the UN High Commission for Human Rights.  Access to the areas is severally restricted.  Morocco authorities do not accredit NGOs said Polisario representative for Switzerland, Sadafa Ahmed Bahia.

Bahia wants the international community to pressure Morocco into accepting those accreditations for Swiss organizations in the hopes of generating more awareness for a conflict that rarely gets into the news.

Eighty countries recognize SADR as the legitimate political representative of the Sahawri.

written November 8, 2008

Next blog entry will discuss final day of EUCOCO.

written November 7, 2008 

If all goes as planned, for the next few weeks I’ll be telling you a story that is thirty-three years in the making.  It begins in the barren deserts of the Western Saharan and stretches into a protracted stalemate between the Saharwi people and Morocco.  It involves a conflict of state-centric interests, human rights abuse, plunder of natural resources, refugees, a status quo, a fragmented independence movement, and a monarchy with a nationalist agenda.  It involves people, some with extraordinary abilities to mobilize and continue a struggle against insurmountable odds.  The likes of Aminatour Haidar, who next week will be awarded the 2008 Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award figure among those. 

Now I can go into detail and history of the Western Sahara conflict but I would do it no justice.  Three decades of history cannot be so succinctly summarized in a few lines of text.  For those interested, I recommend International Crisis Group reports.  However, in very crude terms, it’s a conflict that involves one people’s right to self-determination as guaranteed by UN Resolution 1514 and a kingdom that claims the disputed territory as its own.  No one wants to concede.  Rooted in the status quo are the lives of  some 160,000 Saharwi refugees  who bake in the dry, isolated deserts of south western Algeria - which I wrote a short piece on last year. 

Its another miserable attempt by the UN to broker a settlement where conflict of state-centric interests (notably Security Council members US and France) clash with  international laws and the UN Charter’s on decolonization. Neither the US nor France is willing to compromise its strategic partnerships with Morocco over the rights of a people who have no money and pose no immediate threat. It is also a story with its own set of unique superlatives in Africa - longest running land dispute, longest running UN mission.  And some call it the continent´s last colony though that seems to disregard the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla.  I should also like to mention that there are regional stakes invovled.  Morocco opted out of the African Union way back in 1984 in protest of the union´s recognition of the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR).  SADR is the Saharwi government in exile fronted by the Polisario. 

Today I attended the 34^th annual EUCOCO conference(EU Conference for the Support of the Sahawri People)  in sunny Valencia, Spain. Scheduled to start at 3pm, the conference finally got underway at five. The conference objective is to set out a road-map and a plan of action for 2009 through a series of seven workshops  - political action, humanitarian aid, human rights and occupied territories, lawyers, trade unions, women, culture and art. 

For the next several hours a crowd of around 500 people listened to a series of speeches espousing  democracy, human rights, and a firm commitment to self-determination and support of the  Saharwi people.  Delegates from around the world took to the mike - including Mexico, South Africa, Mauritania, Mali, Chili, Uruguay, Senegal, Algeria, Peru, Angola, Spain, France, and Italy. A delegate from Russia was also present but didn’t speak. There was no UN representative.

 Algeria’s delegate said his country was committed in its support of the Polisario and the right to self-determination.  « We are clearly in favor of basic rights, of human rights, we are saying and still are saying that the realization of these rights has yet to be recognized. The Saharwi people are not asking anything from the international community but only its fundamental rights which we support, » he told the assembled followed by a round of applause.

I managed to corner the Algerian delegate in the lobby afterwards and asked him whether or not the conflict didn´t also involve his country’s border dispute with Morocco.  The delegate somewhat graciously declined to answer and explained he was not officially representing Algeria and could not make statements on its behalf. Algeria has no border dispute with Morocco he said before slipping away into the crowd. 

The first day of EUCOCO conference addressed the issues of human rights and self-determination.  While such topics are indeed worthwhile, the delegation failed to mention some of the inherent problems of the conflict - the UN and several of its Security Council members and a status quo that also implicates the Polisario.

Next blog entry will discuss human rights and the occupied territories.

The conditions of life in the Sahrawi refugee camps is far from easy. Isolated in a desert in south-western Algeria, many of the refugees have spent their entire lives dependent on international aid. But a recent article in the International Herald Tribune quoting former Sahrawi refugees now residing in the Moroccan controlled Western Sahara are making claims that the Polisario are like a mafia who restrict movement, imprison dissenting refugees, and siphon off food aid for their own benefit. I say Moroccan controlled because no OECD nation officially recognizes Morocco’s claim on the territory.

I find these accusations highly suspect. For one, these former refugees are invited to Washington and New York by a Moroccan-American lobby to plead a pro-Moroccan policy concerning the conflict. “The reason Morocco is funding their trip is to try to discredit the Polisario at a moment when they hope that its own proposal for autonomy will prevail,” said a representative to the Moroccan UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

Second, the refugees have the right to leave the camps. Every year, several thousand Sahrawi refugee children spend their summers in Spain, sponsored by private individuals and solidarity organizations. As the article points out, representatives from Human Rights Watch and UNHCR know of no cases where refugees were deliberately prevented from leaving.

Third, having reported from the camps, I was able to see first hand what the conditions are like. I was able to walk about the camps at will, unaccompanied, enter homes, and speak to various individuals. And indeed, I came across many frustrated individuals, especially the youth who have a strong desire to renew the armed conflict against the better judgment of some of the Polisario leadership whom I also interviewed. This is not to say that the Polisario are not without their caveats. Baba Sayed, a senior Polisario leader, expressed his frustration with the organization accusing it of maintaining a status-quo mentality that was out of touch with many of the refugees.

In the blistering summer heat of the Algerian desert, 28-year old Sahrawi refugee Brahim Boudjemaa is telling me his story. It is one shared by many like him, that of anger, frustration, and a hope against the odds. Born and still living in a refugee camp, he sweeps his arm across his chest so as to show me what I already knew. The sparse surroundings of a harsh desert climate and a conflict that is thirty years old; Africa’s longest running land dispute – the Western Sahara. And then he tells me of a prison in the Moroccan-occupied territory and of an intifida that the world seems to have ignored.

This is not a new story, only one that has seldom been told. An uprising among a marginalized Sahrawi population finally erupted into a full-scale protest in the streets of Laayoune, capital of the Moroccan held Western Sahara. It rapidly spread to neighboring cities of Tan-Tan, Dakhla, Smara and then to the universities in Agadir, Marrakech, Casablanca, Rabat and Fez. This was in May 2005 and the pro-independence protests met heavy resistance from Moroccan security forces. Over the course of the next three years, several hundred Sahrawi have been jailed, and a Crisis Group report(pdf) says secret detention centers may have since surfaced. While many were later released, Amnesty International (AI) says some protesters received six-year sentences. Accusations of torture abound and then confirmed by the Moroccan Association of Human Rights (AMDH).

Moroccan security forces arbitrarily arrest anyone suspected of pro-independence sympathies. No freedom of assembly, no rights to demonstrate, and a disproportionate use of force are some of the human rights abuses sweeping throughout the territories. Foreign media is banned from reporting on the Western Sahara inside Morocco. Moroccan journalists criticizing King Mohammed VI’s policy face severe punishment. And yet someone is bearing witness as the stories continue to reach AI, AMDH, and even Brahim, isolated in a desert thousands of kilometers away. It reminds me of what Milan Kundera once wrote, “The struggle against authority, is the struggle against memory and forgetting.” Perhaps in this context, Brahim’s hope against the odds may at least be partially realized.

And in this spirit, I commence the journey of FPA’s latest blog. Looking forward to your comments. All the best - Nikolaj