Geneva, March 15, 2012 (MAP)
The statements of the Algerian delegation to the U.N. Human Rights Council (HRC) go against recent momentum in relations between the two countries and efforts of the revival of the Maghreb Union, said Omar Hilale, Morocco’s Ambassador Permanent Representative in Geneva.
“The statements of the Algerian delegation are not likely to consolidate the recent momentum in bilateral relations initiated by the two countries, or the re-launch of the AMU,” said Hilale before the 19th HRC session, as part of his right of reply, whose a copy was forwarded on Wednesday to MAP news agency.
Speaking at the general debate on “human rights situation that require the attention of the Council,” the diplomat expressed his “profound surprise” regarding the statement of the Algerian delegation regarding the Moroccan Sahara issue.
“The approach clearly contradicts the recent joint decision of both Foreign Ministers of the Kingdom Morocco and Algeria to leave this issue, as a whole, in the hands of the UN, to achieve a political solution mutually acceptable to this dispute. Also, the statements of the Algerian delegation are not likely to consolidate the recent momentum in bilateral relations initiated by the two countries, or the revival of the AMU,” said Hilale.
For the Moroccan diplomat, “the reaffirmation by the Algerian delegation of the content of its previous statements means the reaffirmation of my delegation, in turn, of its previous positions, about our national cause (the Sahara issue).”
As regards the content of the declaration of Algerian and what it called the three aspects of the Moroccan Sahara issue, he recalled that this litigation is “highly political and based on a regional dispute,” the subject of informal talks whose last round ended on Tuesday in New York, under the auspices of the U.N. Secretary General and his Personal Envoy, with the participation of all parties, including Algeria.
“This negotiation should be safeguarded against any kind of provocative statement as well as sterile,” he noted.
As for the humanitarian dimension, he said, it clearly involves the UNHCR, especially in its first census of the populations of the Tindouf camps (Algeria’s south-west). The requirement of registration, he recalled, has been an urgent call of the U.N. Security Council in its resolution 1979 of April 2011, to the host country, asking it to authorize the UNHCR to carry out its implementation.
“The populations of the Tindouf camps are the only ones in the world not to be recorded, which fundamentally affects their status and their safety and promotes the embezzlement of humanitarian aid destined for them,” he added.
Turning to the dimension of human rights, he stressed that Morocco is “strong in its momentum of its leading democratic reforms in the region. Morocco is strong in its new Constitution which is a real a human rights charter. It is also strong in its legal and institutional human rights, covering all regions of the country including the Sahara.”
