AFAPREDESA
The Association for the Families of Saharawi Prisoners and the Disappeared
Morocco to free all Western Sahara prisoners
The report acknowledged that after 15 years and more than $600
million, the U.N. has been unable to resolve the standoff between the
Moroccan government andMorocco to free all Western Sahara prisoners
AFP
April 22, 2006
RABAT -- Morocco's King Mohammed VI has decided to free all prisoners
from the disputed territory of Western Sahara currently being held in
jails in the kingdom, an official source said on Saturday.
"The sovereign has pardoned all the Sahrawi prisoners and they are
already being freed," the source said, adding that there were 48
prisoners in all, in jail for political or criminal offenses.
The pardon followed a request from the royal consultative council on
Sahrawi affairs (CORCAS), set up by the king. It was made during his
visit in late March to the capital of Western Sahara, Laayoune.
Mohammed VI had asked the council, made up prominent figures, local
politicians and Sahrawi non-governmental organisations, to make
suggestions about a plan for self-government for Western Sahara which
Morocco is to submit in the near future to the United Nations.
The head of the prison in Laayoune said at least 27 detainees there
were due to be released.
Rabat annexed phosphate-rich Western Sahara after colonial ruler Spain
pulled out in 1975. It has proposed autonomy for the territory, while
rejecting United Nations demands for it to be allowed a referendum on
self-determination.
A UN-sponsored ceasefire between Morocco and the Polisario Front,
which wants independence for Western Sahara, came into effect in 1991.
The truce was supposed to have been followed by a referendum on
self-determination in Western Sahara but Rabat failed to comply,
initially raising objections over who was entitled to vote.
It has since dismissed UN proposals that the referendum follow a
five-year period of autonomy for the 266,000 square kilometers (90,000
square miles) of desert flatlands on Africa's northwestern coast.
Morocco has refused to join the pan-continental African Union because
the latter recognises the Polisario-declared Sahrawi Arab Democratic
Republic, as do around 70 governments across the world.