The Polisario Front's document to the UN: empty reiteration and an exhausted strategy

On October 20, 2025, the Polisario Front submitted a proposal to the UN Secretary-General entitled “Mutually acceptable political solution providing for the self-determination of the Sahrawi people.” At first glance, the gesture appears to be a diplomatic opening. But upon examining its content, it reveals itself to be an empty reiteration, with no new contributions and no recognition of the political, legal, and regional transformations that have marked the Sahrawi conflict in recent decades. 

The Polisario's “new” proposal merely recalls that it already presented another in 2007. There is no evolution, no adjustment, and no recognition of the current context. It insists on the referendum as the only way forward, ignoring the fact that autonomy—as proposed by Morocco—is a form of self-determination recognized by international law, particularly Resolution 1514, supplemented by Resolution 1541 on decolonization.

The document states that the Polisario is willing to negotiate with Morocco “not only to resolve the sovereignty conflict,” but also to establish “strategic and mutually beneficial relations between the two states.”

This formulation reveals an obsession with predetermined self-determination, as Franco's last minister, Cortina Mauri, who dealt with the Polisario in depth on the issue in the midst of the 1975 crisis, rightly warned: the Polisario is not seeking a free consultation, but “predetermined self-determination.”

This conclusion was reached when Spain was still in the Sahara and was looking for ways to withdraw within the bounds of international law. It was Hassan II who solemnly proposed the referendum at the OAU Summit in Nairobi in 1981, committing himself to accept even independence.

In 1984, he reiterated this from the UN podium. But Algeria and the Polisario rejected the offer, claiming that there was already a “reality on the ground” and demanding the transfer of powers. To exert pressure, they promoted the admission of the SADR to the OAU, even though this entity did not meet the conditions of statehood.

International indifference and Morocco's subjection to serious and continuous military and terrorist attacks—including assaults on ships on the high seas, murders, and kidnappings of sailors taken hostage to Tindouf in Algerian territory, presented as propaganda trophies on international television and as bargaining chips, especially with Spain—forced Morocco to build the containment walls.

In 1988, the popular uprising in Algeria—which attacked symbols of the regime such as the FLN and the Polisario headquarters—together with Moroccan advances, forced Morocco to agree to study the UN proposal. Thus was born the Cuéllar Plan, which could not be implemented until September 1991.

After a decade of fruitless efforts, the UN had to abandon the referendum as a means of self-determination, given that Morocco could not allow the Polisario to achieve, through a tailor-made electoral body, the independence of the Sahara that it had been unable to achieve by force of arms.

The Secretary-General's report S/613/2001 is key: it proposes autonomy as a third way between two failed maximalist positions. It was the UN that asked Morocco if it would agree to offer a substantial autonomy model, and Morocco, with great institutional, legal, and economic effort, accepted the challenge.

For five decades, Morocco has faced a war imposed by the Polisario, armed and financed by the “revolutionary” regimes of Gaddafi and Boumediene. At the same time, it has developed the Sahrawi provinces, holding democratic elections, creating local institutions, and guaranteeing parliamentary representation. These advances have been systematically rejected by Algeria and the Polisario, which even protest to the UN while maintaining a warmongering rhetoric.

The Polisario denounces the status quo, but forgets that it was the work of the Algerian military regime. Colonel Boumediene defined it as “a thorn in Morocco's side.” It was a strategy to keep Morocco in a state of constant attrition and a status quo that would allow Algeria to consolidate its regional hegemony. Many Polisario leaders, upon hearing this confession, realized that they had been used as instruments of the DRS.

The Polisario proposes “moving away from unilateral and forcibly imposed policies,” forgetting that its founding charter invokes revolutionary violence as a method. In February 1976, it proclaimed itself the SADR, without a prior referendum or any other legal legitimation. Since then, it has sought to regularize this self-determination, already exercised unilaterally, without dismantling the structure that sustains it.

The Polisario document calls for the construction of the Maghreb, ignoring the fact that it already exists institutionally with five member states. The Moroccan proposal for autonomy under national sovereignty, praised by most of the international community and especially within the Security Council, could inspire a “Maghreb of Autonomies,” where regional peculiarities are respected without compromising territorial integrity, especially Algeria in the face of the independence movement in Kabylia (MAC).

The Polisario's proposal offers no solutions, only repetitions. It ignores history, international law, and regional transformations. Morocco has offered a serious, credible political path in accordance with UN principles. It is time for the international community to recognize the real dynamics of the conflict and support a solution that guarantees peace, stability, and dignity for all the peoples of the Maghreb.

Jamal Eddine Mechbal Lawyer, essayist, and former diplomat