Rabat- Horst Kohler will run a meeting today at the UN Security Council to discuss developments in the region.
Kohler, the UN Secretary General’s Personal Envoy for Western Sahara, will present his first briefing on the situation in the region since the adoption of the UN’s Resolution 2414 on April 27.
The resolution extended the mandate of MINURSO’s mission until October 31, 2018, and called for a “realistic, practicable and enduring” political solution to the conflict.
The meeting is also set to revive negotiations between Morocco and Polisario and discuss the future of MINURSO’s mandate.
Kohler will brief the council about his 10-day tour of the region from June 23 to July 1, including his visit to the regional human rights commissions’ headquarters in the Western Saharan cities of Laayoune and Dakhla in southern Morocco
The envoy’s tour was aimed at monitoring progress in the region with regard to human rights in the wake of reforms Morocco initiated.
Kohler displayed satisfaction with his tour: “I am satisfied with this visit during which I met many people and visited different places,” he told the state-owned news, Maghreb Arab Press (MAP), at his departure from Hassan I Airport in Laayoune at the end of his visit.
Kohler’s visit came after a series of controversial actions by the Polisario Front in the restricted region.
On May 20, Polisario carried out a parade east of Morocco’s defense wall to celebrate the “45th anniversary of its armed struggle,” a move the Moroccan government considered a violation of the resolution just a few weeks after its adoption.
Morocco strongly denounced the destabilizing maneuver as a defiance of the 1991 ceasefire agreement between the kingdom and Polisario and of Resolution 2414.
