This post will mean little to most readers….but it does to me and since this is my blog I will write on…..
I have written about the plight of the people of Western Sahara….https://lobotero.com/2018/04/30/western-sahara-update/
My interests in Western Sahara is personal…..I was there in 1980s and fell in love with the desert and its people…..and ever since I have been watching the international tap-dance being done by the West to prevent the people from having their country back from Morocco.
According to a report from Axios, the Biden administration told Morroco that it would not reverse the Trump administration’s move to recognize Morrocan sovereignty over Western Sahara, which was Rabat’s reward for normalizing relations with Israel.
Sources told Axios that Secretary of State Antony Blinken conveyed the message to Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita in a phone call on Friday. A State Department readout of the call did not mention Western Sahara but did say Blinken discussed Morroco’s relationship with Israel.
“The Secretary welcomed Morocco’s steps to improve relations with Israel and noted the Morocco-Israel relationship will bring long-term benefits for both countries,” the readout said.
The Trump administration recognized Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara in December 2020, making the US the first country to do so.
Morocco annexed Western Sahara after the Spanish withdrew from the region in 1975. Rabat then fought a war with the Polisario Front, a group that represents the indigenous Sahrawi people, to control the territory until a ceasefire was reached in 1991. Now there are fears that a new war is brewing. Last month, the Polisario Front said its police chief was killed in what could have been a Morrocan drone strike.
In 1976, the Polisario Front formed the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), a de facto state in Western Sahara. The SADR is a member of the African Union and maintains diplomatic relations with about 40 UN member states. Currently, the SADR controls about 20 percent of Western Sahara, and Morocco controls the rest.
President Biden is following through on other Trump-era favors for Arab countries that took steps to normalize with Israel. Biden is going ahead with a massive $23 billion weapons package to the UAE that includes F-35 fighter jets, reaper drones, and missiles.
(antiwar.com)
Many of us writers are calling for a re-engagement internationally on the Western Sahara question and the plight of the people.
The long-dormant conflict between Morocco and the Polisario Front over the disputed Western Sahara territory is showing troubling signs of life. A Polisario blockade of a key artery in the UN-monitored buffer zone triggered a Moroccan military response, after which the Front called off a ceasefire and resumed attacks.
The last guy as president made a crappy deal on Western Sahara and Biden will leave the deal in place.
In the last move the Polisario of Western Sahara is demanded a seat in the UN….
The Polisario Western Sahara separatist group on Monday demanded a United Nations seat for the disputed territory and accused France and Spain of impeding a referendum on self-determination.
The status of Western Sahara, which the United Nations classifies as a “non-self-governing territory”, has for decades pitted Morocco against the separatist Polisario Front.
“The Sahrawi state claims its seat at the UN,” said Polisario foreign minister Ould Salek, on behalf the republic declared by the Polisario in 1976.
The republic, as a founding member of the African Union, “demands its rightful place” among world nations, he told a news conference in Algiers, allies of the Polisario.
It takes a special kind of hypocrite and spineless cowards to deny a people the right to self-determination.
The US is a prime kind of cowardice for it preaches democracy and never stands by the demands it makes….the right to self-determination is just a slogan that falls from American mouths.
New leadership is needed…and NOW!
I Read, I Write, You Know
“lego ergo scribo”
In Saner Thought 
I remember that bitter war, and the mess the Spanish left behind when they pulled out of their former colony.
Best wishes, Pete.
You and I may be the only people that remember….chuq
Great post. I’ve long been a fan of little known, and geographic outliers.
Thanx…I was there as a researcher for a Spanish newspaper….chuq
Reblogged this on Ned Hamson's Second Line View of the News.
THanx my friend….chuq