Forgotten sahara

The Polisario censors Trump's recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara: "It does not correspond to him." Illustrated Service (Automatic) / Europa Press

The recognition by Donald Trump of Morocco's sovereignty over Western Sahara is an outrage of international legality recognized by the UN and a wrong gesture that further complicates the possibility of negotiated solutions in a forgotten conflict.

Trump undertakes, a few weeks after leaving the White House, a wrong and far-reaching decision for that crisis that none of his predecessors - they were Republicans or Democrats - had dared to make.

The president thus strengthens the strategic alliance with Rabat and uses the conflict in Western Sahara as a bargaining chip to promote, along with Morocco, the normalization of relations between the Arab countries and Israel.

That normalization is a laudable goal;

the currency of exchange to obtain it, no.

Trump's gesture is part of a picture of abandonment by the international community of its duty to mediate.

More than four decades have passed since Spain handed over Western Sahara.

Morocco knew how to take advantage of the death throes of the Franco regime.

Spain promised to respect the right of self-determination of the Sahrawis.

But he didn't, and that's where the problems began.

The Sahrawi organization waged a 16-year war against Morocco and in 1991 they agreed to a ceasefire in which both parties agreed to hold a self-determination referendum.

The conflict, little by little, has fallen into international oblivion.

Trump's decision also comes in the midst of the worst crisis that this conflict has experienced in three decades of ceasefire.

The Polisario Front decreed a state of war on November 14, after the Moroccan Army expelled from the demilitarized zone of Guerguerat, on the border with Mauritania, about fifty Sahrawi civilians who had been blocking the road for three weeks.

The Sahara crisis constitutes an unmitigated failure for the UN, which maintains a mission whose objectives in theory are to monitor the ceasefire and organize a self-determination referendum.

The Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, has not appointed a personal representative for the Sahara since May 2019. The laziness of the international community has played in favor of the stronger party, Morocco.

Rabat exploits the fishing riches of the Sahara, the phosphate mines and for 10 years it has been promoting a growing tourism industry.

A score of countries, generally African, have opened consulates in the territory.

On the other hand, important countries in this matter such as France and Spain openly choose to cultivate the bilateral relationship with Morocco, strategic for migratory, terrorism, security and commercial reasons.

Its relevance is undeniable.

Meanwhile, the Sahrawis continue to demand a referendum.

Morocco does not even contemplate it and offers an autonomy plan that, in view of its characteristics and the context, is an offer without guarantees comparable to a regional autonomy within a Western State.

The current situation is unsustainable.

The UN must reactivate itself to mediate, in search of consensual solutions, in an abandoned conflict.

Spain, for historical reasons, should have a leading role in this.

The difficulty is extraordinary.

But that is no reason to quit.