De Mistura’s visit to Sahrawi refugee camps, occasion for reaffirming Sahrawi people’s commitment to their right to self-determination

CHAHID EL HAFED (Sahrawi refugee camps) – Representative of the Polisario Front to the United Nations and coordinator with MINURSO, Mohamed Sidi Omar, said that the visit of UN Secretary-General’s Personal Envoy for Western Sahara, Staffan De Mistura, to the Sahrawi refugee camps, scheduled for Thursday, and his meeting with Sahrawi officials will be an opportunity to reaffirm the Sahrawi people’s commitment to their right to self-determination, freedom, and independence.

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In a statement to APS, Mohamed Sidi Omar said that De Mistura’s visit to the refugee camps to meet with the Sahrawi side "is part of the preparation for the briefing he will submit to the UN Security Council on October 16."

He noted that this visit "aims to strengthen his relations with the Polisario Front as well as with the Moroccan occupying state."

This third visit comes at a "difficult time," where the Western Sahara peace process is "at a standstill" due to the stubbornness of the Moroccan occupier, which violated the ceasefire agreement signed in 1991 on November 13, 2020, when it was agreed to hold a referendum for self-determination, said the diplomat.

He also stressed that this visit comes "at a time when the occupying state is intensifying its repression and implementing a scorched-earth policy in the occupied part of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, where the Makhzen continues to plunder and confiscate Sahrawi lands as part of a colonial policy aimed at stripping the Sahrawi people of their land and replacing them with Moroccan settlers." [/ecr]