Los países del Caribe Oriental inauguran su Consulado en Dajla

The Organisation of Eastern Caribbean Countries inaugurated on Thursday its Consulate in the city of Dakhla, located in the so-called Southern Provinces of the Kingdom of Morocco, showing the support of these Caribbean nations to the Alawi kingdom in the development and promotion of the territory close to the Western Sahara region. 

The Arab Maghreb press agency reported that the opening of the Consulate took place with the participation of the Moroccan Minister of Foreign Affairs, Nasser Bourita, the Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Dominica, Roosevelt Skerrit, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, International Trade and Diaspora Relations Abroad of the Commonwealth of Dominica, Kenneth Darrox, as reported by Sahara Media. 

This opening of the consular body would serve to express the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean Countries' support for Morocco's plan to extend Western Sahara's autonomy under Moroccan sovereignty in order to resolve the Saharawi conflict, which has lasted for too many decades. A Moroccan formula that has received significant international support from nations such as the United States, the United Arab Emirates, Germany, the United Kingdom and, more recently, Spain, which, through its president Pedro Sánchez and its Foreign Minister, José Manuel Albares, has also stated that the Alawi kingdom's proposal is the most serious, credible and realistic way to reach a political agreement for the Sahrawi territory. 

This is in contrast to the Polisario Front's totally opposed initiative, which advocates holding a referendum on independence for the Sahrawi population and has little support, including that of Algeria, Morocco's great enemy and political rival in the Maghreb, which decided to break off diplomatic relations with the Alaouite kingdom last August.

The city of Dakhla already hosts several consulates of different countries such as Sierra Leone, Senegal, Gambia, Guinea, Djibouti, Liberia, Burkina Faso, Guinea Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the Republic of Haiti, that is, a total of 24 diplomatic representations in the southern territories of the Kingdom. 

On the other hand, both the United States and the United Arab Emirates also announced some time ago the opening of consular delegations in the region, thus giving their full support to Morocco. The last major boost to the Moroccan proposal for the Sahara came from the last US administration of Donald Trump when it gave its support to the formula of autonomy for the Sahara under Moroccan sovereignty in December 2020, within an agreement with King Mohammed VI whereby the Kingdom also established diplomatic ties with Israel in return. A political move that followed in the wake of the famous Abraham Accords by which Arab countries such as the Emirates and Bahrain established political ties with the Israeli state under the auspices of Donald Trump's US administration in August 2020. 

This political impetus for Morocco, also subsequently backed by Joe Biden's government, was exceptional, and this was followed by a series of positive announcements from other nations offering support for Morocco's proposal to resolve the Sahara issue. In this way, nations such as the UK, Germany and even Spain came to recognise the Moroccan proposal as the most realistic and serious way of resolving the Saharawi conflict that has lasted for more than four decades. 

Morocco offers an alternative marked by seriousness and rigour that would allow Western Sahara to have broad autonomy within the Alawi kingdom in an administrative and political formula that would make it possible to develop the region socially, politically, and administratively, providing a great option for progress and regional development.