Activité des forces marocaines au Sahara occidental : Abdelaziz écrit à Ban Ki-Moon

Bir Lehlu (territoires libérés), Le président de la République, Mohamed Abdelaziz a appelé le SG de l’ONU, Ban Ki-Moon et le Conseil de sécurité, afin d’exiger du Maroc "d’arrêter immédiatement ses travaux militaires offensifs en cours au Sahara occidental et à la reprise immédiate des négociations entre les parties au conflit pour la mise en application des résolutions du Conseil de sécurité".

"Nous vous appelons, Monsieur le SG, comme nous appelons le Conseil de sécurité, à tout faire pour qu’un terme soit mis à cette escalade et cette exhortation à la guerre en exigeant du Maroc d’arrêter immédiatement ses travaux militaires offensifs en cours au Sahara occidental et à souscrire à vos recommandations pour une reprise immédiate des négociations entre les parties au conflit pour la mise en application des résolutions du Conseil de sécurité", a écrit le président de la République à M. Ban dans une lettre parvenue à SPS.

M. Abdelaziz qui s’exprimait dans une lettre au SG de l’ONU à l’occasion du nouvel 2009, a adressé ses meilleurs voeux les meilleurs de santé et de succès "dans votre noble mission en faveur de la paix dans le monde conformément aux idéaux et principes de la charte de l’Organisation des Nations Unies".

Voici le texte intégral de la lettre :


"Monsieur le Secrétaire Général,

Je voudrais tout d’abord, à la veille de la nouvelle année 2009, vous adresser mes plus vives félicitations et mes voeux les meilleurs de santé et de succès dans votre noble mission en faveur de la paix dans le monde conformément aux idéaux et principes de la charte de l’Organisation des Nations Unies.

Monsieur le Secrétaire Général,

Depuis quelques jours, il a été constaté la concentration d’un grand nombre d’engins, de bulldozers et de camions à la frontière nord-est du Sahara occidental avec le Maroc. Mais, aujourd’hui, il est manifeste que ce mouvement de matériel a pour objectif une activité militaire déclarée de l’armée marocaine, au mépris des termes du cessez-le-feu en vigueur dans le territoire, depuis le 06 septembre 1991.

En effet, l’armée marocaine entreprend actuellement, depuis la región de Mahbés au nord-est du territoire, une grande opération de reconstruction et consolidation du mur militaire englobant les territoires occupés du Sahara occidental. A ce jour, les travaux incluant la surélévation du mur à plus de cinq mètres de hauteur, le réaménagement et fortification des bases des compagnies et unités militaires ont atteint plus de dix kilomètres à l’intérieur du territoire sahraoui au niveau du point 27º 35’ 661 Nord et 08º 46’ 622 Ouest.

Alors que l’accord du cessez-le-feu entre l’Armée sahraouie et les forces armées royales marocaines, du 06 septembre 1991, et plus tard l’accord militaire nº1 établissaient clairement que les deux parties sont tenues de respecter l’état de situation prévalant avant la cessation des hostilités et partant interdisaient tout renforcement ou consolidation de leurs dispositifs militaires respectifs, cette nouvelle provocation du Maroc constitue une violation gravissime de la trève supervisée par les Nations Unies et une provocation inadmissible.

Le Maroc ne peut indéfiniment de la sorte défier la communauté internationale tout en refusant le dialogue et la négociation, en foulant aux pieds les règles du Droit international qui font du respect des droits du peuple sahraoui à l’autodétermination un passage obligé pour la solution du conflit maroco-sahraoui et en violant, dans l’impunité totale, les droits humains au Sahara occidental, comme vient de le rappeler, dans son dernier rapport, l’ONG Human Rights Watch et avant elle l'Office du Haut Commissariat des Nations Unies pour les droits de l'homme.

Aussi, nous vous appelons, Monsieur le Secrétaire général, comme nous appelons le Conseil de sécurité, à tout faire pour qu’un terme soit mis à cette escalade et cette exhortation à la guerre en exigeant du Maroc d’arrêter immédiatement ses travaux militaires offensifs en cours au Sahara occidental et à souscrire à vos recommendations pour une reprise immédiate des négociations entre les parties au conflit pour la mise en application des résolutions du Conseil de sécurité.

Hautes Considérations.

Mohamed Abdelaziz, Président de la RASD
Et Secrétaire général du Front POLISARIO."

UPES calls for the protection of Palestinian citizens from genocide

Photos of 5 Palestinian sisters /between 4 and 12 years old, killed in Gaza Saharawi Journalists’ and Writers’ Union (UPES) called on the international community, Wednesday in a press release, to protect the Palestinian citizens in Gaza Strip from the genocide and mass killing committed by the Israeli army. The text vividly condemned the attack, which is waged by the Israeli army against Gaza since last Saturday, as “a real premeditated genocide” against Palestinian. The Saharawi journalists and writers express their principled and unconditional solidarity with the Palestinian people, who are now targeted by a blind killing machine that doesn’t distinguish between kids and elderly. Reports talk so far of more than 384 Palestinian killed, including more than 21 child, and more than 1700 persons injured. The press release also compared the current attacks against innocent people to the Moroccan army attacks against the Saharawi population during the Moroccan invasion of the last colony in Africa in 1975. UPES also called on the UN and on governments to act quickly and without more delays to protect the Palestinians and compel the Israeli government to put an end to its violations of the international legality, human rights and international human values. It also called on the neighboring countries, especially Egypt, to assume their responsibility and provide the Palestinian with all needed support and assistance without further delay. The text finally warned against the Israeli attempts to put Gaza under complete Medias and military siege so as to exterminate the Palestinian resistance.

Moroccan forces of occupation targets children in Western Sahara (report)

Sources of the Saharawi Journalists’ and Writers’ Union (UPES) in the occupied zones of Western Sahara and in the south of Morocco indicated that the Moroccan forces of occupation targets more and more Saharawi children and primary schools’ students, arresting them, torturing them and interrogating them with a lot of intimidating psychologically dangerous ways. Last Sunday 21st December 2008, the Moroccan police arrested the 16 years old student Charaf Addin Mohamed Salem Dichkour. He was driven in a police car to a police station in the city where he was subjected to interrogation and torture “as it is the custom”, the same sources added. In the next day, the family of the young student indicated to Saharawi human rights activists that he was released “and had obvious traces of torture on his body. The family had to take him to the hospital in the city. Doctors asserted that he has a fracture in the muscles of his left arm as a result to torture and to the ill-treatment he was subjected to in the police car”. The boy also told the human rights activists that he spent the whole night without clothes on the bare and cold cell without bedding or blankets. He also said that his torturers undressed him to scare him of rape. In the city of El Aaiun, another 16 years kid, Hassan Saad Buh, was arrested by the Moroccan police last Saturday 27 December 2008 after he got out of school. Right after that, another student, Bazeid Lahmad, was arrested allegedly because the Moroccan police is accusing him of distributing leaflets that demand the decolonisation of Western Sahara! Both kids were taken to the central police station in the occupied capital of Western Sahara, El Aaiun, as reported by the Saharawi Collective of Human Rights Defenders (CODESA). In the occupied city of Smara, the kidnapping and torture of a 9 years old Saharawi girl, by a group of Moroccan police agents, cause a wide condemnation in the city. The little girl said in a video that her kidnappers, which she is able to identify as she said, took her outside the city “in a place where there are many trees”, to beat her, interrogate her about some girls who participate to peaceful demonstrations apparently. She said that her kidnappers insulted her with “bad words”, and probably threatened her of rape! To make her give them the names of demonstrators. In the city of Tanta, in 10 December 2008, a group of Saharawi youngsters were arrested, including a minor, Bakar El Kentawi, after a violent intervention from the Moroccan police to disperse a peaceful demonstration of protest in front of the house of El Houssein Abd Sadek Lakteif (a young Saharawi student who was killed along with another student, Baba Khaya, by Moroccan authorities in Agadir during a sit-in organised in 1 December 2008). According to human rights activists’ sources, the group of detainees was taken by the police to the stadium of the city where they were all beaten savagely, ill-treated and threatened of rape before they were released without any charges! In 03 November 2008, the young Saharawi girl, Enguia Elhawassi, said she has been kidnapped by Moroccan police and interrogated under torture outside the occupied city of El Aaiun. Enguia, it should be recalled, has been arrested more than 6 times since 2005 and her name and story has been reported in the latest report of Human Rights Watch on the human rights situation in Western Sahara. Saharawi minor, Mohamed Saaidi, has been arrested on 03 September 2008 and transferred to the notorious Black Prison (Carcel Negra) in the occupied city of El Aaiun, where he has been imprisoned with adults. Saaidi has been arrested during his participation in a peaceful demonstration in the neighbourhood of Al Aawda. Demonstrators only lift Saharawi flags and chant slogans asking for the independence of Western Sahara. He was subjected to torture and interrogation during the period of his arrested and the police forced him to sign false confession to incriminate him. In the same month in the occupied city of Smara, a police patrol arrested the Saharawi minor, Basiri Salah, in the neighbourhood of the neighbourhood Salam. He was subjected to violent interrogatory and tortured in the police station. In May 2008, the Moroccan police in the occupied city of El Aaiun arrested many young Saharawis. Their number and names couldn’t be identified by the human rights activists, but they were able to notice that there was a young girl, minor, among the arrestee. This group was arrested after a student’s peaceful demonstration. Once taken to the hospital Belmehdi in El Aaiun, the young girl, Fatma Laaziza Belkasmi, indicated that she was subjected to torture in the police station. She also said that all the arrestee were badly tortured by policemen, and by agents in civil clothes. Worse, she asserted to the sources of UPES that few minutes after she was taken to the hospital, a nurse started torturing her to help some police agents interrogate her. She said that the nurse stabbed her with injections in sensitive parts of her body to make her talk, while the policemen stopped her parents outside the hospital for three hours. In Mars 2008, concordant sources in El Aaiun told UPES that the Moroccan forces of occupation arrested and tortured dozens Saharawi citizens, after they violently dispersed a peaceful demonstrations asking for the independence of Western Sahara. The same sources said that 10 children were among the group. The names of the kids are: Deich ould Mohamed Mbarek Masoud, Ayub Mohamed, Yassin, Mahmoud Beilal, Baba Ahmed Ndour, Sid Ahmed Garhi, Mohamed Atam, El Wali and Krikou, all of them are between 11 and 12, in addition to the 8 years old boy, Najem Burial. In February 2008, the Moroccan police in the occupied El Aaiun arrested Abd El Hay El Kaskas (12 years old) and his younger brother Mohamed Bachir El Kaskas. They both were subjected to torture and intimidation before they were released. In January 2008, the Moroccan police arrested two kids at least after they violently dispersed a peaceful demonstration in the occupied cities of Smara and Boujdour. Police was reported to have used excessive violence in the intervention causing many dangerous injured victims, including minors. Source then indicated that the child, Ahmed Nahi, was taken by police outside the city of Boujdour. They tortured him and threatened to rape him to force him give the names of his friends. In the same month, the Moroccan police sealed schools to scare the young students, intimidating them and insulting them after some slogans were written on the walls of some schools. In this respect, the police arrested the student Mahmoud, took him to a police station and he was bashed and intimidated. In January too, policemen arrested a minor in a cyber café, mainly Mahmoud Labeihi, because he was navigating on the net and visiting some Saharawi websites that demand the decolonisation of Western Sahara! In brief, the Moroccan premeditated attacks against the Saharawi young generation and kids aims to intimidate them, push them to give up their studies and sometimes even to break their future for ever. In many cases the kid ends up with a serious physical of psychological handicap of injury that would be very hard to cure.

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Saharawi Government condemns the massacre in Gaza

The Government of the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) and the Polisario Front condemned, Monday, the massacre committed by Israel against Palestinians in Gaza Strip since Saturday, in which more than 350 victims were killed and 1600 injured, according to SPS. The Government of the SADR considers that "the use of force, the policy of occupation, killing and terror against defenceless citizens are contrary to morals, laws and customs of the humanity and are in contradiction with international legality." Based on this principle, Saharawi Government, "expresses its solidarity with the Palestinian people in the tragedy subsequent to the massacre perpetrated by Israeli forces against Palestinians in Gaza Strip", said the text. The Saharawi Government and the Polisario Front which strongly condemn this criminal aggression against the Palestinian people, "urged the international community and all peoples and governments, especially the Arabs to act urgently in order to bring to a halt these premeditated assaults, to protect the defenceless Palestinian people and lift the siege imposed on Gaza Strip."

Testimony of a Saharawi woman about the human rights’ situation in the occupied territories

Melek Ameidan is a young Saharawi woman who lives in the occupied territories of western Sahara, by telling her own experience in the short Youtube’s video below she tries to describe how the Saharawi people live and fight the Moroccan army of occupation, and she emphasizes the Saharawi women’s participation in all the peaceful demonstrations against the Moroccan colonial presence in Western Sahara.