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Rabat – Mustafa Salma Ould Sidi Mouloud, a former Polisario police chief, has slammed Algeria for the inhumane conditions that the Sahrawis live under in the Tindouf camps.
The Sahrawi activist has repeatedly warned the international community about the situation in the Tindouf camps.
In one of his recent Facebook posts, Mustafa Salma also criticized Algeria’s decision to terminate the Maghreb-Europe gas pipeline contract, which supplied Spain with Algerian gas via Morocco.
“I hope Algeria can mobilize a smart part of the surplus from which ‘its enemy Morocco’ benefited to the ‘friendly’ camp residents who have been living on its territory for 46 years,” he said.
Mustafa Salma cited a recent conversation with a Sahrawi activist friend living in the camps, who he said strongly criticized Algeria for the conditions under which Sahrawis are living in the Polisario-run Tindouf camps in Algeria.
In response to a recent statement in which the Algeria-backed Polisario leadership accused Morocco of occupation, Mustafa Salma’s anonymous friend said that Sahrawis live under “occupation” in Algeria itself.
“We live under the yoke of a despicable and abhorrent occupation, our poverty turned us into beggars after we were stranded in the land of Algeria a time ago when our fathers trusted the leadership of the Polisario Front and believed their lies,” Mustafa Salma quoted his friends as saying.
He also reported the anonymous Sahrawi activist as saying that the Polisario Front will always consider the Sahrawis as “slaves” even if they reached “independence.”
“We need to liberate ourselves first [from Algeria and Polisario], to be masters in our decisions and partners in our destiny. Then, we can think about liberating the land, sharing it, or even throwing it to the dogs and wandering in the desert,” the activist reportedly said.
Mustafa Salma’s friend emphasized that Sahrawis in the Tindouf camps are “occupied” by a minority group that took everything from them.
Like many other observers of the Sahara conflict, Mustapha Salama also interpreted Algeria’s decision to terminate the Maghreb-Europe gas pipeline contract, which links Algeria to Morocco and Spain, as a result of Morocco’s diplomatic gains in the Guerguerat region.
The former Polisario police chief warned of the situation in the Tindouf camps, saying that addressing the chronic mistreatment of distressed Sahrawi refugees should take precedence over reported tensions in Guerguerat, a crossing post between Morocco and Mauritania.
Oualid Kebir, an Algerian political analyst, and journalist made the same remarks after an Algerian official publicly criticized Morocco in support of his country’s decision to terminate the contract of the Europe-Maghreb pipeline.
Amar Belani, an Algerian controversial diplomat, declared that Morocco did not meet the requirements “of the historical and strategic ambition represented by this huge project.”
In response, Kebir said the Algerian government had “bargained with Morocco on the issue of the Moroccan Sahara.”
He also argued Algeria urged Morocco to withdraw from Guerguerat in exchange for maintaining the gas pipeline.
“Belani’s words confirm what I mentioned earlier!” he added.
Over the years, there have been converging reports and testimonies emphasizing the dire conditions that Sahrawis live under in the camps of Tindouf.
Recently, Morocco’s ambassador to the UN, Omar Hilale, said thousands of Sahrawis risked their lives to escape the inhuman conditions in Tindouf camps.
He said that over 20,000 people have fled the camps, while several dozen have been killed by the Algerian army or by the Polisario mercenaries while trying to escape.
