New York- The United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon released on Friday his annual report on the situation in the Western Sahara.
The report, which was obtained by Morocco World News, was submitted to the members of the Security Council pursuant to resolution 2152 by which the Council extended the mandate of the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) until 30 April 2015.
Unlike the reports submitted to the Council the last two years, the report makes no recommendation to the Security Council to extend the mandate of the MINURSO to include a human rights monitoring system in the Sahara and the Tindouf camps.
However, while commending the “positive steps that Morocco has taken on the protection of human rights,” including the adoption of a new code on military justice and the accession to the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against torture, the report calls for "independent and impartial understanding" of human rights in the Western Sahara.
“I call on the Parties to continue and further enhance their cooperation with United Nations human rights mechanisms and OHCHR, including by facilitating OHCHR missions to Western Sahara and the refugee camps near Tindouf, with unrestricted access to all relevant stakeholders," the UN chief said in his annual report.
"These missions and other future forms of cooperation ... should contribute to an independent and impartial understanding of the human rights situation in both Western Sahara and the camps, with the goal of ensuring protection of all," he noted.
The report makes no recommendation on the involvement of the African Union in the conflict.
Earlier this week, Morocco voiced its strong opposition to any involvement of the AU in the conflict, arguing that this organization has no legitimacy to play a role in the settlement of the dispute by taking position on favor of the Polisario.
No mention of embezzlement of humanitarian aid
What is striking in the report is that it omits any mention of the substantiated embezzlement of humanitarian aid by the Polisario and Algeria.
While it calls on the international community to “urgent additional funding the UNHCR mandate program in the refugee camps near Tindouf,” the text falls short of highlighting the involvement of Algeria and the Polisario in the embezzlement of humanitarian aid destined for the camps.
A report released by the European Union’s Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) last February documented “well-organized, year’s long” embezzlement by the Polisario Front of humanitarian aid designated for Sahrawis in the Polisario-run camps in Tindouf, Algeria.
The OLAF report conducted between 2003 and 2007 and unearthed recently, slams Algeria and the Polisario Front for embezzling humanitarian aid meant for Sahrawi refugees for years.
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