Latest news with #Sahrawis
Ya Biladi
17 hours ago
- Politics
- Ya Biladi
Spain approves the reception of 3,000 children from the Tindouf camps
The Spanish government has approved the reception of «around 3,000 children» from the Tindouf camps this summer. «At the proposal of the Ministry of Inclusion, Social Security, and Migration, the Council of Ministers has taken the necessary steps to authorize the temporary stay of Sahrawi minors and issue visas for their chaperones, as part of the 'Holidays in Peace 2025' program», the government said in a statement. Launched in the mid-1990s, the program aims to temporarily host Sahrawi children from the Tindouf camps. Between 2014 and 2024, approximately 34,500 Sahrawi minors benefited from the initiative, according to the same source. The program is coordinated by several associations supporting the Sahrawi people, the National Sahrawi Delegation, and the Sahrawi delegations of various autonomous communities. The Ministries of Inclusion, Social Security, and Migration; Foreign Affairs, the European Union, and Cooperation; Interior; Territorial Policy; and Democratic Memory, along with the autonomous communities hosting the children, all participate in this effort. Over the past decade, regions such as Andalusia, Catalonia, Castilla-La Mancha, the Basque Country, and Galicia have been the main hosts for Sahrawi minors under the program. Initially launched in 1979 by Spanish communists, «Holidays in Peace» has since been used by the Polisario to promote its position in Spain. Last year, the Forum of Support for Tindouf Autonomists (FORSATIN) criticized the program, warning about the «uprooting of peace ambassadors». Ten days ago, sources from Spanish intelligence services reported that «dozens of Sahrawis born in the Tindouf camps (Algeria), who had participated in the 'Holidays in Peace' program», were found to be involved with terrorist groups operating in the Sahel, according to the daily La Vanguardia.
Morocco World
13-06-2025
- Morocco World
Laâyoune-Sakia El Hamra: Morocco's Desert Frontier Finds Its Voice
In 1927, famous French writer and aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupéry was posted to the edge of nowhere. Cape Juby, now Tarfaya, sat between the Atlantic's restless surf and the brooding stillness of the Sahara. Then a driven, promising young aviator, Saint-Exupéry was in charge of managing a refuelling post for the Aeropostale mail route. He spent his days navigating sandstorms and his nights scribbling reflections that would later feed into The Little Prince . Today, that same outpost lies at the heart of a region attempting something quietly audacious: to turn isolation into allure. Cape Juby, now Tarfaya, sat between the Atlantic's restless surf and the brooding stillness of the Sahara in the region of Laâyoune-Sakia El Hamra Laâyoune-Sakia El Hamra is Morocco's least-known tourism asset. Located in the far south, it has long been burdened by geopolitical ambiguity and geographic remoteness. But it is now being recast as a showcase for Saharan heritage, eco-tourism, and cultural reawakening. The regional capital, Laâyoune, offers a visual collage of contradictions. Palm-fringed avenues sit beside crumbling colonial buildings. Souks spill into grand squares like Place du Mechouar, where tensile canopies shade tea-sipping Sahrawis and football-mad children weave between them. The architecture is an uneasy dance between Spanish legacies and Rabat's efforts to modernize the periphery. Palm-fringed avenues sit beside crumbling colonial buildings. Beyond the city, the landscape does much of the talking. Khenifiss National Park, a coastal wetland, attracts migratory birds in the tens of thousands. Flamingos, shelducks, and even ospreys wade through the Naïla lagoon, the largest of its kind in the country. Farther south, a natural sinkhole near Akhfennir known as the Devil's Hole provides a geological spectacle steeped in local lore. Inland, the Sakia El Hamra wadi cuts through the desert, feeding tales as much as ecosystems. Tarfaya remains a time capsule. Offshore, the ruins of Casa del Mar, a crumbling fortress once intended as a commercial hub, jut out into the sea. In town, a small but earnest museum commemorates Saint-Exupéry's stint in the region, where his correspondence and navigation charts speak to a romance with remoteness. The architecture is an uneasy dance between Spanish legacies and Rabat's efforts to modernize the periphery. More recently, the region has found a different rhythm. Cultural festivals have begun to reassert Sahrawi identity. The Hassani Poetry Festival revives oral traditions that speak of exile, honour and endurance. More eclectic in tone, the Wennibik Festival fuses Bedouin instruments with hip-hop and reggae. Music workshops, backed by philanthropic outfits like the Phosboucraa Foundation, aim to train local youth and give Saharan traditions a modern beat. Film, too, is having a moment. In 2024, Laâyoune hosted its first Desert Film Festival. Though modest in size, its ambition was clear: to document the desert not as a void but as a canvas where stories of migration, resilience and identity are played out in frame and form. The Hassani Poetry Festival revives oral traditions that speak of exile, honour and endurance. Smara, once a religious centre, has retained its spiritual hush. Founded in the 19th century by a Sufi scholar, it was once famed for its Koranic library. These days it is more likely to attract curious travellers than devout pilgrims, but its decaying zawiya and script-covered walls retain a monastic gravity. The local cuisine is blunt but sincere. Camel meat tagines and sand-baked bread dominate the menu. Tea – served in three rounds, as custom dictates – functions less as a refreshment than a ritual. Camel milk, rich and tangy, is a nod to a nomadic diet built for endurance. Adventure tourism is the latest banner under which the region seeks economic redemption. Camel treks, desert camps, birdwatching and off-road excursions are increasingly packaged for visitors seeking what they call 'authenticity'. The authorities are betting that its combination of low footfall and high storytelling potential can become a selling point. Morocco has invested heavily in soft infrastructure But the stakes are not only touristic. Laâyoune-Sakia El Hamra remains politically sensitive. It is part of the Western Sahara region, a territory whose Moroccan identity is challenged by the Polisario Front, a separatist group financially and logistically supported by Algeria. Morocco has invested heavily in soft infrastructure – museums, festivals, and artisan cooperatives – to bolster its narrative and bind the region closer to the national core. The result is a place where history is contested, but the welcome is not. Visitors find themselves not in the middle of a conflict but at the edge of something else: a region slowly, deliberately, reclaiming its voice. For now, Laâyoune-Sakia El Hamra remains off most itineraries. Yet for those who make the journey, it offers not just spectacle, but also substance.
Morocco World
12-06-2025
- Politics
- Morocco World
EU Adds Algeria to List of High-Risk Countries for Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing
Rabat – The European Commission has amended a list of high-risk jurisdictions, adding Algeria to the list of a group of high-risk third countries identified as having strategic deficiencies in their systems for combating money laundering and the financing of terrorism. The commission announced the new update on June 10, noting that the inclusion takes into account the risk assessment by the Financial Task Force (FATFS). The document from the European Commission shows that Algeria was added to the FATFS in October of last year, after the country failed to meet international standards. Algeria's inclusion on the high-risk list could be a clear and explicit signal by the European Commission's position against Algeria's regime support and financing of the Polisario Front. This comes as many international observers, MPs, and politicians increasingly call on the international community to designate the separatist group as a terrorist organization. The Polisario Front receives billions of dollars from the Algerian regime, which uses the separatist group as a political tool to exert its agenda of challenging Morocco's territorial integrity over its southern provinces. Under Algeria's support, the Polisario Front has also been embezzling humanitarian aid and financial assistance directed to Sahrawis who are suffering from dire malnutrition and drought within the Tindouf camps. Algeria's addition to the high-risk list also comes amid a growing wave of international support for Morocco's territorial integrity and sovereignty over its southern provinces in Western Sahara. Over 113 countries now support the Moroccan Autonomy Plan, recognizing it as the most serious and credible political framework for resolving the Western Sahara dispute. Algeria's inclusion on the grey list also came a few weeks when the EU categorically repudiated the self-styled 'SADR' – the Polisario Front leadership that is fully backed by Algeria. 'Neither the EU nor any of its Member States recognize the SADR,' the EU spokesperson for foreign affairs said in May in the wake of an Algeria-sponsored allegation in support of separatism claims to challenge Morocco's territorial integrity. This came after Polisario members traveled to Brussels to take part in an EU-African Union ministerial meeting at the invitation of the AU. 'The position of the EU is well known, and that the illusory entity's presence at the EU-AU ministerial meeting has no influence whatsoever on this position,' the spokesperson said, sending a new devastating diplomatic setback for the Polisario separatist agenda sponsored by the Algerian regime.
Morocco World
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Morocco World
New US Report Sheds Light on Polisario's Regional Threats, Growing Support for Morocco
Rabat – Amid a growing support for Morocco's position on Western Sahara, several reports have surfaced to shed light on the dispute, particularly Polisario's links to terrorism, a situation that undermines the whole region and beyond. The National Interest is among the magazines, research publications, and news outlets that tackled the regional instability the Polisario is instigating as it aligns itself with terrorist groups as well as US adversaries, including Iran. Growing momentum for Morocco Recalling the international chorus in support of Morocco's territorial integrity, the National Interest published a comprehensive analysis authored by Ahmed Sahrawi on Monday, stressing that more and more countries are agreeing with the Moroccan security approach to safeguard its southern provinces in Western Sahara and preventing the region from becoming home to a 'jihadist government.' 'The United Kingdom recently recognized Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara, joining the United States, France, and Israel,' the same source said. On June 1, the UK joined the international chorus for the first time, announcing Morocco's Autonomy Plan as the most serious and credible political solution to end the dispute over Western Sahara. With this decision, the country has been added to a list of over 113 countries that share the same perspective and that seek an end to the stagnant issue. Kenya and Ghana recently shared a similar stance amid Algeria's maneuvers to challenge Morocco's territorial integrity and sovereignty over its southern provinces. Algeria's regime harbors the Polisario Front in a deserted area, where freedom of speech and movement are restricted. About 90,000 Sahrawis have been stranded in the region, with many seeking escape but unable to leave due to restricted movement, turning Tindouf into an open-air prison for many. Algeria is still barring a census for the region, due to the presumed fact, as many Sahrawis suggest, that most of the Tindouf residents are Algerians or from other countries and regions like Tuaregs and nationals of neighboring countries, such as Mauritania, Mali, Niger, and Chad. Former Polisario members, including Mustafa Salma, suggest that as little as 20% of the real Sahrawis were forced to take shelter in the camps. 'The Polisario has, in recent years, aligned itself with some of the most radical actors in the region,' the National Interest wrote, recalling how the region became a breeding ground for 'jihadist recruitment and a nexus for extremist networks operating across the Sahel.' The publication further stressed the well-documented ties between the separatist group and terrorist groups, recalling Adnan Abu al-Walid al-Sahrawi, a former Polisario member who also led the Islamic State in the Greater Sahel before he was killed by French forces in Mali in 2021. The same source also recalled Polisario's breaking of the UN Ceasefire in 2020, when Morocco peacefully intervened to halt Polisario's blockade in Guerguerat near the Mauritanian border, affecting trade relations. The analyst further detailed the multiple threats and attacks the Polisario Front has been carrying out, targeting Moroccan civilians as well as foreign businesses operating in southern provinces since 2021. In May, members of the Polisario Front, including Mustapha Sidi Ali El Bachir, sent their threats to Moroccans, foreign businesses, as well as tourists visiting southern provinces. The Polisario member appeared in a video on May 1, noting that the separatist group is reiterating and confirming that 'in line with Polisario's statement from November 13, 2020, announcing the return to war, any foreign investor or tourist in the Sahara is putting their life at risk.' 'Let the Sahrawi stay away from foreigners and not come telling us they're civilians or innocent. This is not a tourism context, but a wartime context,' he said. Increasing awareness of Polisario's fake activism The National Interest is not the first US-based website to highlight Polisario's threats to the region. In May, The Daily Signal issued a similar comprehensive piece, in which it recalled that high-ranking officials, like Republican Congressman Joe Wilson, have sought to designate the Polisario Front as a terrorist group due to its malicious activities targeting the region's stability. The outlet also criticized the US administration for ignoring Polisario's threats. Notably, the report also mentioned Polisario's armed threats and its unilateral decision to withdraw from the UN-brokered ceasefire in 2020. Like the National interest, the Daily Signal also referenced Iran's support for the Polisario Front through its proxy Hezbollah, which Morocco accused of training and arming the Polisario Front through a collusion with Algeria. 'Polisario's threats rest on a foundation of Algerian sanctuary plus three mutually reinforcing pillars: Iranian military assistance, a growing Russian influence network, and a mature trans-Sahel illicit economy that overlaps with jihadist financing streams,' the Daily Signal wrote. In April, the Washington Post quoted sources who confirmed that Hezbollah trained Polisario to serve and advance its regional interests. 'Over the years, Iran has fostered a wide array of proxy groups to advance its interests,' the report said, quoting a regional official and a third European official who said Iran trained fighters from the 'Algeria-based Polisario Front' that are now detained by Syria's new security forces. In the same month, a report published by the Hudson Institute dismissed Polisario's self-portrayal as a liberation movement, describing the separatist group as a paramilitary organization that functions as 'a destabilizing militia.' Notably, the report, authored by Zineb Riboua, documented how the Polisario's activities 'go far beyond the standard for a terror designation.' Also in the same month, American Enterprise Institute (AEI) scholar Michael Rubin published a piece , urging the UN to cease recognizing the Polisario Front as the legitimate representative of the Sahrawi people, in which he described the group as 'a vestige of the Cold War.' Rubin challenged the international community's stance on Polisario's legitimacy, asserting that 'no one has ever elected them to such a position and no one has given the Sahrawi any say.' Tags: Algeria and the Western SaharaPolisario and Algeria
Ya Biladi
10-06-2025
- Politics
- Ya Biladi
Polisario protests La Vanguardia's report linking Sahrawis to Sahel terrorism
An article published by La Vanguardia linking Sahrawis from the Tindouf camps to the leadership of terrorist groups in the Sahel has sparked outrage from the Polisario Front. In a letter of protest to the Spanish newspaper, the group's representative in Spain condemned the analysis as «damaging to the image and reputation of the Sahrawi cause, as well as to the broad solidarity movement that supports it across Spain». Abdellah Arabi urged the paper to «correct its mistake», after it reported that Sahrawi youths born in the Tindouf camps, some of whom had taken part in the « Holidays in Peace » program, had gone on to join armed groups operating in the Sahel. According to a Moroccan source who spoke to Yabiladi, the article was a key item on the agenda during an emergency meeting of the Polisario's permanent General Secretariat, held on Sunday, June 9, at the Rabouni camp and chaired by Brahim Ghali. No official statement was issued following the meeting. This latest controversy comes just weeks after the Polisario sought to contain the fallout from statements by one of its so-called «ministers», who had called for attacks on tourists and investors in Western Sahara. At the time, the group's representative in Spain dismissed the remarks as «alleged statements attributed to a minister of the SADR», claiming they were part of a disinformation campaign in Moroccan media aimed at discrediting the Polisario, which it described as «the sole legitimate representative of the Sahrawi people».
