Staffan de Mistura has been in Rabat since Monday, but will not go in the disputed territory between Morocco and the Polisario Front for decades.
Le Monde with AFP
The United Nations emissary for Western Sahara, staff of Mistura, has been in Rabat since Monday July 4 to meet Moroccan officials, but has given up a visit planned in the disputed territory, said the UN.
“The secretary general envoy for Western Sahara is in Rabat to meet Moroccan officials,” the UN spokesman Stéphane Dujarric told New York. According to Moroccan media, Mr. de Mistara arrived in Morocco on Saturday. “He decided not to carry out a visit to Western Sahara during his trip, but he hopes to do it during the next visits to the region,” added Mr. Dujarric.
During a press conference on Friday, on the eve of Mr. Mistura’s departure for Rabat, the UN spokesman said he intended to go – for the first time – In Western Sahara during his stay.
The question of Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony considered as a “non -autonomous territory” by the UN, has opposed Morocco for decades to the Sahraouis separatists of the Polisario Front, supported by Algiers.
” Advance the dialogue “
In a press release published in New York, the Polisario “deeply regretted” the cancellation of Mr. de Mistura’s visit, believing that Rabat “tried to prevent him from directly testifying to the situation on the land in occupied Sahrawi territories “. He accused Morocco of “having imposed preconditions on where he [the UN envoy] should go and who should meet during his visit to the occupied Sahrawi territories”.
No explanation was given to the choice of the High Diplomat Italian-Swedish but, according to sources close to the file, the Moroccan authorities had expressed reservations to such a trip during the previous visit of M. de Mistura in the month January. In addition, he would not have been able to meet all the interlocutors he wanted in Western Sahara.
The visit of the UN emissary – the duration of which has not been specified – was not officially announced in Rabat. “The visits of the personal envoy aim to advance the political process on Western Sahara,” said Dujarric.
Friday, the UN spokesman had said that Mr. de Mistura was meeting “all the actors concerned in the region in the coming days”. “What he is looking for is how we can advance dialogue in the context of the relevant resolutions of the Security Council,” he said.
Rabat, which controls almost 80 % of this territory, offers an autonomy plan under its sovereignty. The Polisario Front calls for a self-determination referendum under the aegis of the UN, provided for at the signature in 1991 of a cease-fire but never materialized.
Appointed in November 2021, Staffan de Mistura had carried out his first tour in the region in January, which had led him to Rabat, Mauritania, Algiers and Tindouf in Algeria to meet the Polisario.