Conflict in Western Sahara: Security Council holds closed session, today, to discuss developments
BY: Hana Saada
ALGIERS- (SPS) The UN Security Council will hold, today, April 19, 2023, a closed session to discuss developments concerning the conflict in Western Sahara, within its monthly program that includes issues of peace and security and the status of peace missions in the world, according to the United Nations website .
During the session, which will be chaired by Russia, the members of the Security Council will hear a briefing by the Personal Envoy of the Secretary-General of the United Nations for Western Sahara, Mr. Staffan de Mistura, on the latest developments of the file, including the results of the unofficial consultations conducted with the two parties to the conflict.
De Mistura also will reviews the work and role of the United Nations Mission to Organize the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO), and ways to revive the political track of the Sahrawi issue, in conjunction with a briefing by the UN Special Representative, Head of MINURSO, Alexander Ivanko, which includes developments on the ground.
The session comes in implementation of Security Council Resolution No. 2654 issued last October, which extended the mandate of the MINURSO mission until October 2023, as it stipulates that a briefing must be given to the members of the Council every six months, in which the Secretary-General of the United Nations or his personal envoy notifies them of the developments of the file.
The meeting on the Sahrawi issue also comes, after a series of unofficial consultations that Mr. Staffan de Mistura,had held last week with the various parties, where they discussed the necessity of resuming the political process of the existing conflict and overcoming the obstacles in order to find a just, lasting and acceptable political settlement to the file.
In this context, de Mistura held consultations with the representative of the Polisario Front at the United Nations and the coordinator with the MINURSO mission, Dr. Sidi Mohamed Omar in New York.
The discussions dealt with the reality and future of the peace process sponsored by the United Nations in Western Sahara, where Sidi Mohamed Omar renewed to the Personal Envoy of the Secretary-General the position of the Polisario Front regarding this issue and other related issues, stressing that “a peaceful, just and lasting solution to the issue of decolonization of Western Sahara, can only take place on the basis of full respect for the inalienable, non-compromising right of the Sahrawi people to self-determination and independence.
In this regard, Sidi Mohamed Omar stressed that the message of the Saharawi people is the “total rejection of the policy of the fait accompli and of solutions outside the framework of international legitimacy,” stressing that one of the conditions for achieving peace in the region and the decolonization of the last colony in Africa, is “the real political will of the Moroccan occupation “.
