Day: June 15, 2011

Where Is Western Sahara?

I know that this post will mean very little to anyone at all…..but for me it is a personal thing for I have been into the area now in dispute…..a personal journey, if you will……so I apologize for the personal break and that I have gone off on a tangent here…..

First of all…please STOP using the term “the Sahara Desert”!  The word Sahara means desert….so you are saying the desert desert……

When I was working in the Middle East I was in Morocco and had a chance to visit Western Sahara….that was shortly after the Spanish pulled out……

Western Sahara is just south of Morocco on the coast with the Atlantic….there is little to NO rainfall….temps got from 115 in day to 30’s at night…..few people and few resources…….Northern Africa, bordering the North Atlantic Ocean, between Mauritania and Morocco

Morocco annexed the northern two-thirds of Western Sahara (formerly Spanish Sahara) in 1976 and claimed the rest of the territory in 1979, following Mauritania’s withdrawal. A guerrilla war with the Polisario Front contesting Morocco’s sovereignty ended in a 1991 UN-brokered cease-fire; a UN-organized referendum on the territory’s final status has been repeatedly postponed. The UN since 2007 has sponsored intermittent talks between representatives of the Government of Morocco and the Polisario Front to negotiate the status of Western Sahara. Morocco has put forward an autonomy proposal for the territory, which would allow for some local administration while maintaining Moroccan sovereignty. The Polisario, with Algeria’s support, demands a popular referendum that includes the option of independence.

A little background to help understand the post a bit better…..

Since 1976 there is been a series of conflicts and situations in Western Sahara but none have been good for the Sahawaris (indigenous people)…..and now the Obama admin has jumped on the Moroccan band wagon…..

“We have stated our belief that Morocco’s autonomy plan is serious, realistic and credible, a potential approach to satisfy the aspirations of the people in the Western Sahara to run their own affairs in peace and dignity,” Clinton told reporters.

The Polisario Front group demands a self-determination referendum in Western Sahara, a phosphate-rich territory that was annexed by Morocco after Spain withdrew in 1975. Morocco has only offered greater autonomy.

This is CRAP!  It is what Morocco wants NOT what the Sahawris want……

In 1991, the United Nations negotiated a ceasefire between the Polisario forces and Morocco. The basis for this was that a UN-supervised referendum would determine the country’s future. However, despite numerous promises and resolutions from the UN, the referendum has not taken place. This is largely due to support for Morocco from the Western powers, particularly France and the US.

Repression in the Moroccan occupied territories continues. On November 8, 2010, Moroccan forces violently attacked non-violent protesters camped at Gdeim Izik, outside the capital El Aaiun. In the aftermath, Moroccan soldiers and settlers attacked Saharawi homes and shops in El Aaiun. An estimated 36 Saharawi were killed and 723 wounded, and 163 were arrested and are currently facing Moroccan military courts.  Does this sound like they will give these people autonomy?  If it does then we are not reading the same books……

My time among the people was great and they were a courteous and friendly people that only wanted one thing……freedom for them and the land….so far all they have gotten is crappy promises from the US, Morocco, France and many other countries….when I was leaving I was asked, “why does anyone but a Sahawris want this land?”  An excellent question…it has NO gas or oil….it has NO arable land….it has NO natural resources other than some phosphates…….this land has nothing but the Sahara and if you ever go there you will NOT want it either……so why is it such an international thing?

I suggest that the US butt out of this situation and let the Sahawris have their own land…nothing about this smacks of the freedom loving American stereotype…it smacks of colonization of one country by another……IT IS NOT RIGHT!  What happen to the belief in self-determination?

Like I have said….most Americans could care less about this piece of sand….but for me it is just something I had to post on…….have a day!

IMF–Killer Of Nations

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has made a lot of headlines in the past month or so…..you know Mr. Cool, the head of the fund was caught trying to make happy with a chamber maid and now there is a woman in France that is trying to make happy with the IMF as its new head….you have heard all the jokes….but how much do you know about the IMF?

The Activist Post has a short history…..

Under a new post-war monetary system, the IMF was created to stabilize exchange rates linked to the dollar and bridge temporary payment imbalances. The World Bank was to provide credit to war-torn developing countries. Both bodies, in fact, proved hugely exploitive, using debt entrapment to transfer public wealth to Western bankers and other corporate predators.

Basically, the IMF is NOT an organization to save country’s economic system, but rather to open them up to exploitation from banks and other raiders……how does this exploitation work, you ask?

the scheme destructively obligates indebted nations to take new loans to service old ones, assuring rising indebtedness and structural adjustment harshness, including:

— privatization of state enterprises, many sold for a fraction of their real worth;
— mass layoffs;
— deregulation;
— deep social spending cuts;
— wage freezes or cuts;
— unrestricted free market access for western corporations;
— corporate-friendly tax cuts;
— tax increases for working households;
— crushing trade unionism; and
— harsh repression against opposition to a system incompatible with social democracy, civil and human rights.

As a result, bankers and other corporate predators strip mine countries of their material wealth and resources, shift them from public to private hands, crush democratic values, hollow out nations into backwaters, destroy middle class societies, and turn workers into serfs if they manage to have any means of employment.

Look at what is being asked of Greece, Portugal, Spain and Ireland and what response is being felt by the people of the countries in question…….the truth is that the IMF has caused the collapse of many countries….in the 1980’s, those countries in a struggling sub-Sahara and in the same time frame many countries of Latin America….yet Article ! of the IMF states….

to give confidence to members by making the general resources of the Fund temporarily available to them under adequate safeguards, thus providing them with opportunity to correct maladjustments in their balance of payments without resorting to measures destructive of national or international prosperity.

Sounds good, huh?  Yep, kinda like the “all men created equal” of the Constitution in the 1850’s…..the IMF destroys more economies than it saves and yet it continues to rape countries of their resources…it is time for the world to realize that these organizations help….but helps only the ones that can do the raping, not the raped……