Sympathizers with Saharawi cause support project for children in refugee camps

Around one hundred sympathizers with the Saharawi cause expressed Saturday in Brussels their support for a project in favour of Saharawi children living in the refugee camps. The support was expressed during a party of "cuscus" held at the initiative of Hilt Teuwen, from the Belgian committee for supporting the Saharawi people and administrator of the regional programme of Oxfama, backed by its head, and Pierre Gallant, who is also president of EUCOCO (Conference of European coordination for solidarity with the people of Western Sahara). The cuscus was donated by three women from Algerian, Moroccan and Western Sahara, while the amount of money that was collected will be entirely devoted to funding for travelling of ten Saharawi children to spend their summer vacation in Belgium. For Ms. Teuwen, the Committee s action in 2009 is not limited to receive Saharawi children in the next summer, but also to make "political awareness activities “ After completing awareness campaign to the European Commission, the Committee intends to conduct next actions to the United Nations, particularly during the months of May, June and October to defend the human rights of the Sahrawi. Said Teuwen, adding that a delegation will present at the Fourth Committee on Decolonization of the UN "to testify that the Saharawi people have the right to self-determination, and that the United Nations must exercise this legitimate right." For his part, Mr. Jamel Zakari, whose mission as a representative of the Polisario Front, in Belgium ended, praised the initiative of this new group who has "revived the idea of vacation in Belgium, which stopped for nearly 15 years due to various pressures. " For him, "this initiative is positive because it allows children who were born in refugee camps, to be ambassadors of their people to their host families in Belgium." After recalling a brief history of the struggle of the Saharawi people for self-determination, which has lasted more than three decades, Mr. Pierre Gallant argued "that acknowledge of Saharawi children is in itself a political act." They have the right to be here and to be recognized as Sahrawi children, "he insisted, before inviting the attendances to ensure that the circle of support for the Saharawi cause in Belgium is becoming wider.

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