2024-07-31 02:58:13
The Algerian authorities have decided to immediately recall their ambassador to France due to the fact that official Paris has recognized the Moroccan plan to grant autonomy to Western Sahara as the only basis for resolving the conflict, Day.Az reports with reference to TASS.
“The French government has finally expressed its frank and categorical support for the colonial state of affairs imposed on Western Sahara. This step, which no other French government has previously considered necessary, was taken by the current government with great ease and nonchalance, without clearly calculating all the potential consequences,” the Algerian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
As the office of the Moroccan monarch reported earlier, French President Emmanuel Macron sent a message to Mohammed VI on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of his ascension to the throne. In it, Macron notes that “the present and future of Western Sahara are within the framework of Moroccan sovereignty.” According to the president, “for France, autonomy [сахарских регионов] under the sovereignty of Morocco is the framework within which this issue must be resolved.”
“Our support for the autonomy plan proposed by Morocco in 2007 is clear and unwavering. It now represents the only basis for achieving a political, fair, lasting solution through negotiations in accordance with UN Security Council resolutions,” Macron said.
Long-term conflict
The situation in Western Sahara has been the subject of a long-running international dispute for many decades. The independence of Western Sahara is sought by the POLISARIO Front (Popular Front for the Liberation of Saguia el-Hamra and Rio de Oro), which was created in the mid-1970s and which, after the departure of the Spanish colonialists, proclaimed the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic and, with the support of Algeria, launched an armed struggle.
The fighting in the conflict zone continued until 1991 and was stopped after the UN sent a peacekeeping mission there. Despite numerous peace initiatives by the international community, the dispute has not been resolved due to the diametrically opposed positions of the parties.
Morocco considers Western Sahara an integral part of its territory and only allows for its autonomy within the kingdom. Since June 2007, Morocco and the POLISARIO Front have held four rounds of negotiations, but all have ended inconclusively.
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