Human rights in Western Sahara

The Government of Morocco sees Western Sahara as its Southern Provinces. The Moroccan government considers the Polisario Front as a separatist movement given the alleged Moroccan origins of some of its leaders.

The Polisario Front argues that according to international organizations, like the United Nations or the African Union, the territory of Western Sahara has the right of self-determination, and that according to those organizations Morocco illegally occupies the parts of Western Sahara under its control. Polisario regards this as a consequence of the vision of a Great Morocco, fuelled in the past by the Istiqlal and Hassan II, and considers itself a national liberation movement aiming at leading the disputed territory to independence under the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic.

The European Union, the African Union and the United Nations do not recognize the sovereignty of Morocco over Western Sahara.

Human rights

The Western Sahara conflict has resulted in severe human rights abuses, most notably the aerial bombardments with Napalm and White phosphorus of the Sahrawi refugee camps, the consequently exodus of tens of thousands of Sahrawi civilians from the country, and the forced expropriation and expulsion of tens of thousands of Moroccan civilians by the Algerian government from Algeria in reaction to the Green March as well as violations of human rights and serious breaches of the Geneva convention by the Polisario Front, the Moroccan government and the Algerian government.

Both Morocco and the Polisario accuse each other of violating the human rights of the populations under their control, in the Moroccan-controlled parts of Western Sahara and the Tindouf refugee camps in Algeria, respectively. Morocco and organisations such as France Libertés consider Algeria to be directly responsible for any crimes committed on its territory, and accuse the country of having been directly involved in such violations.

Morocco has been repeatedly condemned and criticized for its actions in Western Sahara by several international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) such as:

*Amnesty International
*Human Rights Watch
*World Organization Against Torture
*Freedom House
*Reporters Without Borders
*International Committee of the Red Cross
*UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
*Derechos Human Rights
* Defend International
*Front Line Defenders
*International Federation of Human Rights
*Society for Threatened Peoples
*Norwegian Refugee Council
*Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights
*Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies
*Arabic Network for Human Rights Information
*Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network

Polisario has received criticism from the French organization France Libertes on its treatment of Moroccan prisoners-of-war, and on its general behaviour in the Tindouf refugee camps in reports by th
European Strategic Intelligence and Security Center
A number of former members of Polisario who have joined Morocco accuse the organisation of abuse of human rights and sequestration of the population in Tindouf.

During the war (1975–91), both sides accused each other of targeting civilians. Neither claim has met with support abroad. The USA, EU, AU and UN refused to include the Polisario Front on their lists of terrorist organizations. Polisario Front leaders maintain that they are ideologically opposed to terrorism, as they had condemned terrorist attacks and signed the "Convention on the Prevention and Combating of Terrorism", in the framework of the African Union.

Human rights are repressed in the Moroccan-controlled territories of Western Sahara, according to Amnesty International in 2003 and Human Rights Watch in 2004. While the situation has improved since the early 1990s, the political liberalization in Morocco has not had the same effect on Western Sahara according to Amnesty International in 2004., when it comes to having a pro-independence position. There are allegations of police abuse and torture by Polisario-organisations., and suspected dissidents are harassed. The United States State Department reported in 2000 that there were arbitrary arrests of Sahrawis and no organized labor. Prisoners of conscience were kept in squalid conditions according to Polisario-groups. Some Sahrawis also complain of systematic discrimination in favor of Moroccan settlers.

The Moroccan response to the demonstrations of 2005 was very aggressive, and provoked international reactions. In a criticised mass trial in December 2005, 14 leading Sahrawi activists were sentenced to prison sentences; many more had previously been detained. Most of these prisoners were later released by royal decree in the spring of 2006, but some have since again been rearrested.

According to the US State Department's 2006 report on Morocco "The law generally provides for freedom of speech and of the press. The government generally respected these rights in practice, as long as Islam, the monarchy, and territorial integrity (the inclusion of the Western Sahara) were not criticized. Throughout the year several publications tested the boundaries of press freedom."

The US State Department's 2005 report on Morocco's attitude towards human rights noted that " 2004 various international human rights groups estimated that 700 persons were imprisoned for advocating Western Saharan independence." Foreign journalists and visiting missions have been prevented from visiting the territory and in some instances deported from it. In 2004, Moroccan newsman Ali Lmrabet was sentenced to heavy fines and ten-year ban on practicing journalism, for referring in an article to the Sahrawis in Tindouf, Algeria, as being "refugees" rather than "sequestered" or "kidnapped", as is the official Moroccan position. Sahrawi human rights organizations have been refused permission to operate in Morocco: the Sahrawi branch of the Moroccan Forum for Truth and Justice (FVJ) was dissolved in 2003, and its members arrested. They were later released in the royal amnesties of 2006, or before that, even if some have since been rearrested again. Presently, several organisations, such as the ASVDH, operate illegally, with activists occasionally subject to arrests and harassment, whereas others, such as the Polisario close AFAPREDESA, are mainly active in exile.

Sahrawi activists have tried to compensate for this through extensive use of the Internet, reporting from illegal demonstrations, and documenting police abuse and torture through online pictures and video. Morocco has responded by blockading Internet access to these sites in Morocco and in Western Sahara, prompting accusations of Internet censorship. On 20 December 2005 Reporters Without Borders reported that Morocco has added Anonymizer to its Internet blacklist, days after the association recommended the service to Moroccans and Sahrawis wishing to access the banned Sahrawi sites. "These websites, promoting independence for Western Sahara, have been censored since the beginning of December" it reports.

Human rights in Morocco-controlled Western Sahara

The most severe accusations of human rights abuses by the Kingdom of Morocco are the bombings with napalm and White phosphorus of the improvised refugee camps in Western Sahara in early 1976, killing hundreds of civilians, as well as the fate of hundreds of "disappeared" Sahrawi civilians sequestered by Moroccan military or police forces, most of them during the Western Sahara War. Other accusations are the torture, repression and imprisonment of Sahrawis who oppose peacefully the Moroccan occupation, the expulsion from the territory of foreign journalist, teachers and NGO members, the discrimination of the Sahrawis on the labor and the spoliation of the natural resources of the territory.

On the 15th Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, former prisoner, human rights defender and second vice-president of CODESA (Collective of Sahrawi Human Rights Defenders) El Mami Amar Salem denounced that more than 30,000 Sahrawi citizens had been tortured by Moroccan forces since 1975.

The "disappeared"

In 2010 around 520 Sahrawi civilians remained "disappeared" by Moroccan forces, according to human rights groups; some estimate that the total number of "disappeared" could be as high as 1,500. In the past, Morocco denied that any such political prisoners existed, but in 1991 released nearly 200 "disappeared" prisoners, many of whom had been held in secret detention centers since the mid-1970s. Since then, there have been no further releases of "disappeared" prisoners. Amnesty International stated in a 1999 report that:

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In May 2005, the remains of 43 Sahrawi "disappeared" were exhumed from secret prisons on the south of Morocco ( Kalaat Maguna, Tagunit). They were detained in Western Sahara (Laayoune, Smara) & southern Morocco (Tan-Tan, Assa) in the 1970s and 1980s.

In 2008, the head of CORCAS and former leader of the Sahrawi National Union Party, Khelli Henna Ould Rachid, declared:

:"Some Moroccan army officers have made what might be called war crimes against prisoners outside the scope of the war ... Many civilians were launched into space from helicopters or buried alive simply for being Sahrawis".

The same year (4 January) construction workers uncovered a mass grave with approximately 15 skeletons in Smara, in former military barracks built during the 1970s, the period during which many Sahrawis disappeared or were murdered by Moroccan authorities.

Resulting from the "Reconciliation tribunals" in Morocco in 2005, some graves of political dissidents of Hassan II regime (Sahrawis & Moroccans) were uncovered, although the responsible persons of those crimes have never been judged or their identities revealed. Also, the testimonies of witnesses have not been published yet.

In March 2010, a new grave was found by Bou Craa workers on a phosphate mine with 7 corpses, supposedly Sahrawi nomads killed by Moroccan forces during the mid-1970s.

Freedom House

In late 2005, the international democracy watchdog Freedom House listed the abuses of human rights by Morocco. Those relating to political processes were: controlling elections and not allowing Sahrawis to form political associations (such as labor organizations) or non-governmental organizations. The paper included reports of repressive measures against demonstrators.

Amnesty International

After repeatedly calling attention to alleged human rights violations in Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara, Amnesty International (AI) received, in April 2006, two detailed responses from the Moroccan Ministry of Justice. The Ministry declared that human rights defenders were not stopped and were not taken into custody because of their opinions, but because of their implication in acts liable to infractions of the law. It stressed that they were guaranteed their full civil liberties and gave precise details concerning the investigations in progress into the allegations of torture relating to Houssein Lidri and Brahim Noumria. In addition, the letter refuted the specific allegations of harassing and intimidation with regard to other demonstrators in the Sahara.

Amnesty International responded by claiming that the authorities have not answered the principal concern of the organization regarding the equity of the lawsuits of Sahrawi protestors. For instance, no mention was made in connection with the allegations of torture and ill-treatment of detainees, and allegations that defendants were not authorized to quote witnesses for the defence.

In June 2006, Amnesty International released its 2005 report on Morocco and Western Sahara, again citing excessive police force, leading to the death of two demonstrators. In the section: "Protests in Western Sahara" Amnesty reports: "Dozens of people were charged with inciting or participating in violence in the demonstrations. Over 20 were later convicted and some were sentenced to several years in prison. Among those sentenced were seven long-standing human rights defenders who were monitoring and disseminating information on the crackdown by the security forces. Two alleged that they had been tortured during questioning. An eighth human rights defender was detained awaiting trial at the end of the year. All eight were possible prisoners of conscience."

Child recruitment

War Resisters' International stated in 1998 that Morocco conscripts citizens, including Sahrawis in the Moroccan-controlled parts of Western Sahara, into the army; it was a punishable offence to resist. The WRI also cited sources from 1993 saying that " ports indicate that Moroccan authorities in the south have strongly urged under-eighteens to enlist in the armed forces. Fourteen and fifteen-year-old boys in southern Morocco and in the occupied territory of Western Sahara have been allowed to enlist", further citing a source from 1994 that "there are many human rights abuses against the Sahrawi population.So far there has been no investigation of the conduct of the Moroccan army in this conflict." Conscription for the Moroccan army was abolished in 2006.

Polisario Prisoners of War

In addition to the civilian "disappeared", the Polisario Front accuses the Moroccan government of refusing to provide information on the Sahrawi prisoners of war, who were captured on the battlefield during the war years (1975–91). Morocco long denied holding any war prisoners, but in 1996 released 66 Polisario Front POWs, who were then evacuated to the refugee camps in Tindouf, Algeria under international supervision. Polisario maintains that 151 POWs are still missing after being captured by the Moroccan Army, and requests that the Moroccan government shall release them or clarify their fate. Morocco claims it no longer holds any prisoners of war.

Expulsion of Christian foreign workers

Morocco has occasionally expelled small numbers of missionary groups, many funded by U.S. evangelical Churches, in Morocco and in the Western Sahara parts that it controls. But in March 2010, aid groups and Western countries diplomats denounced that only in that month 70 Christian foreign aid workers were expelled without any trial. Some of them were from USA, New Zealand, Netherlands and United Kingdom, causing the protest of some ambassadors. While the Moroccan government accused them of trying to convert children to Christianity, and of proselytism, the Christian groups claim that the government was trying to restrict their work at the "''Village of Hope''" children's home, for abandoned and orphaned children.
Another case was the deportation from El Aaiun of the Spanish teacher Sara Domene. She had been working as a Spanish teacher since 2007. The Moroccan governor of the El Aaiun province sent an expulsion note to the Spanish embassy in Rabat, accusing her of "being a serious threat to the public order and her expulsion is imperative to safeguard public order", in other words, an accusation of proselytism. Sara stated that despite being Evangelic, she is a philologist, and that she exclusively taught Spanish language classes, using the money she earned for a centre for handicapped persons. Sara was expelled 48 hours after she was given notice.

Status at 2010

In October 2006, a secret report by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees leaked to the media by the Norwegian Support Committee for Western SaharaForwarded by Norwegian Support Committee for Western Sahara report by detailing the deteriorating condition of human rights in the occupied territory of Western Sahara. The report details several eyewitness testimonies regarding violence associated with the Independence Intifada, particularly of the Moroccan police against peaceful demonstrators.

In March 2010, the Sahrawi human rights activist Rachid Sghir was beaten by Moroccan policemen after an interview with the BBC
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