De Mistura identifies Morocco and Algeria as the main actors in the Western Sahara conflict

Staffan de Mistura, special envoy of the Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN) for Western Sahara, has identified Morocco and Algeria as the main actors involved in the ongoing conflict over the sovereignty of Western Sahara.

In an interesting interview with the Institute for International Political Studies (ISPI), the Italian-Swedish diplomat referred to the current situation of the Western Sahara dispute and pointed out that the United Nations is working to ‘avoid a conflict linked to tension between two nations in particular, Morocco and Algeria, and a group called Polisario’, in this case in relation to the Polisario Front, a Sahrawi independence organisation supported by the Algerian state, which advocates the holding of a referendum on independence for the Sahrawi people. 

The reference to the Polisario Front as a ‘group’ and not as a representative of the Sahrawi people or a liberation movement is relevant in diplomatic discourse and highlights Algeria's crucial role in the ongoing conflict. Although the Algerian state has avoided being at the centre of the problem, leaving a greater role to the Polisario Front, the main international ally of the independence group is precisely Algeria, Morocco's political rival in the Maghreb region.

The United Nations Secretary-General's Special Envoy for Western Sahara noted that tension in the region is not limited to the dispute between Morocco and the Polisario Front, but extends to reflect the nature of the relationship between Morocco and Algeria.

Several analysts interpret Staffan de Mistura's statements as dismantling the Algerian narrative that has presented the Polisario as the alleged representative of the Sahrawis, reaffirming what many international observers have maintained for years: that the Polisario Front is an instrument of Algerian foreign policy, used to exert pressure on Morocco.

This position of the UN Secretary-General's Special Envoy for Western Sahara is in line with United Nations resolutions, which have urged Algeria to take an active part in the talks and negotiations between the parties involved in the search for a solution to the Sahrawi dispute, including Morocco, Mauritania and the Polisario Front itself.

There is international pressure on Algeria to become fully involved in the voting on United Nations resolutions on Western Sahara and thus assume its political responsibility in the matter. Above all, it should also be borne in mind that thousands of Sahrawi refugees are living in camps on Algerian territory, such as those in Tindouf, where refugees subsist in difficult living conditions with a lack of all kinds of resources, as various analysts have pointed out.

The conflict over the sovereignty of Western Sahara continues almost five decades after the end of Spanish colonial rule, and a negotiated and peaceful solution under the auspices of the UN is required.

Morocco is proposing its Autonomy Plan for Western Sahara, which would mean broad autonomy for the Sahrawi territory under Moroccan sovereignty, in accordance with United Nations resolutions. This proposal would give the Sahrawi authorities a great deal of self-government, leaving foreign and defence policy in the hands of the Moroccan state.

More than 100 countries, including major powers such as the United States, France, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, Germany and Spain, support the Moroccan proposal, considering it the most serious, credible and realistic solution to the Sahrawi dispute.

Meanwhile, the independence proposal advocated by the Polisario Front has less international support, including that of Algeria.

In this regard, Algeria remains a political rival of Morocco in the Maghreb, despite the fact that the Moroccan king, Mohammed VI, has reached out to his Algerian neighbour on numerous occasions to redress the situation and establish friendly diplomatic relations, as was the case in the past, when Morocco even supported Algeria in its process of independence from France.