WEEKLY NEWS

WEEK 35, 26.08.- 01.09.1996

Headlines

UN Secretary general's report: reaction of Polisario Front
Manifestations of young Sahrawis in Morocco : continuation
8th Congress of Panafrican Youth Movement

26.08.96
UN Secretary general's report: reaction of Polisario Front
In a letter addressed to the president of the Security Council the Polisario Front notes once more the partiality of the Secretary general. "His position of Pontius-Pilatus does not alow the MINURSO to manage the peace plan in a credible way". For example: the report pretends that:" the two parties reaffirmed their acceptation of the peace plan". But in his speach of July 7th, king Hassan II declared clearly that: "Morocco will stay in its Sahara, with or without referendum" !
Concerning identification, same partiality: "The position of Morocco is not compatible with those of Polisario", he writes. In reality, looking at the cited speach, the Moroccan position is not compatible with the peace plan ! Particularly because Morocco refuses the publication of the identified voters, as planned by theS.G.'s report of January. The Polisario also is surprised about the silence of the Secretary general concerning the continuing reinforcement of the military presence of Moroccan forces on the Northern border. It is worring about the POWs and political prisoners and is afraid of their physical elimination, establishing that the ICRC could visit only 75 POWs in Morocco during 20 years. Where are the others?
Finally it regrets that the report does not mention the hundreds of Sahrawis manifestating at Rabat at the beginning of August and does not investigate the cases of the Sahrawis condemned at Boujdour for their participation to a pacific manifestation on last May 20th.

28.08.96
Moroccan Interior Minister Driss Basri with 10 other Ministers reached El Ayun to meet representatives of all the cities of the Sahara.

29.08.96
At UN subcommittee for human rights in Geneva the french NGO France-LibertŽs made an intervention asking for the respect of the human rights concerning the young Sahrawis involved in the manifestations of Rabat. The Moroccan representative in his response declared: " there must be no preoccupation about citizens acting for right in recpect of the law".

31.08.96 In a communiquŽé published after the visit of the Moroccan delegation in Western Sahara, the Polisario Front notes that "no real answer was given to the demands of the Sahrawi youth". The delegation made only demagogic promises and did not meet the young Sahrawis but spoke only with representatives of the authorities and notables. The real objective of the visit was to controle the investigations of the security forces in order to identify the agitators and to calm and put to sleep the public opinion before using repression. The Polisario appeals to stay watchfull and asks the MINURSO to protect the suspects.

01.09.96
8th Congress of Panafrican Youth Movement
About 60 youth organisation fron 40 countries participate to the 8th Congress of Panafrican Youth Movement at Alger.Morocco is absent, probably because of the presence of a SADR delegation.

NEW PUBLICATIONS

• The Western Sahara conflict: a case study in failure of prenegociation and prolongation of conflict, Zoubir Yahia H., California Western Int. Law J., 26, 2, 1996, pp. 173-213.
• La col�re de Bhiya, Ratiba A., Le Matin (Alger), 29.08.96.