Western Sahara: the courage of peace rather than the illusion of waiting
Every announcement of new negotiations on Western Sahara provokes the same reactions: fear, suspicion, accusations of betrayal. These feelings are human and understandable after decades of broken promises and accumulated suffering. But they cannot, on their own, constitute a political project.
The debates opened by the upcoming talks under US supervision reveal above all a disturbing truth: our cause is trapped in a strategy that has been frozen for nearly half a century, while the world has changed profoundly.
While the same old rhetoric is repeated, an entire generation is growing up in camps with no clear future, dependent on humanitarian aid, deprived of real political and economic choice. This is not victorious resistance, but slow and silent attrition.
Refusing all dialogue in the name of ideological purity may give the illusion of firmness. In reality, it condemns us to diplomatic isolation and the gradual disappearance of the Sahrawi question from the international agenda.
The Sahrawi Movement for Peace advocates a different approach: political realism. Negotiating does not mean capitulating. It means seeking, with lucidity, to transform an unfavorable balance of power into concrete rights for our people: security, elected local institutions, recognition of Sahrawi identity, equitable management of resources, and a dignified return for refugees.
The real danger is not peace, but the perpetuation of conflict. A conflict with no prospects breeds despair, internal divisions, and a loss of confidence in any collective action.
Today, courage is not just about brandishing slogans inherited from the past. It is about daring to ask a simple and responsible question: how can we guarantee a dignified life for the Sahrawi people, here and now?
Peace is not a defeat when it is built with the people and for the people. On the contrary, it becomes the very condition for their political and human survival.
Mohammed Cherif, Sahrawi Movement for Peace (MSP)