GOA AND POLISARIO REACT TO MOROCCAN KING'S VISIT

UNCLAS ALGIERS 000556 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PREL PBTS PHUM AG MO WI SUBJECT: GOA AND POLISARIO REACT TO MOROCCAN KING'S VISIT TO "SOUTHERN PROVINCES" BELKHADEM: WESTERN SAHARA DISPUTE ONE OF DECOLONIZATION -------------- -------------- ¶1. In reaction to the visit last week of the Moroccan King Mohammed VI to the western side of the berm in the Western Sahara, the GOA and Polisario made public statements. Abdelaziz Belkhadem, former Foreign Minister and currently Minister of State and Personal Representative to President Bouteflika, asserted March 26 in Khartoum (in an interview that was broadcast by Al-Jazeera television) that the Western Sahara dispute was an issue of decolonization. Speaking on the margins of the Arab Summit preparatory ministerial and reiterating long-held Algerian views, Belkhadem said the "best way to achieve a settlement of the problem of Western Sahara is through implementation of international legal decisions (i.e. Security Council resolutions) establishing the right of the Sahrawi people to self-determination." ¶2. Framing his argument on principle and avoiding direct criticism of Morocco, Belkhadem pointedly added that the Houston negotiations which took place in 1997 between representatives of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic and of Morocco established "the right of the Sahrawi people to self-determination." He noted that those negotiations established a benchmark for United Nations decisions concerning Western Sahara and reminded that the issue of the Western Sahara appeared every year on the agenda of the Fourth UN Commission as a decolonization issue. POLISARIO: BAKER PLAN HAS INTERNATIONAL CONSENSUS -------------- -------------- ¶3. In remarks widely reported in the Algerian press, Hritani Lahcene, counselor to Polisario leader Muhammad Abdelaziz, adopted a shriller tone, calling the King's visit "a media circus" in violation of international law. "The King of Morocco," he said, "speaks of autonomy (for the Western Sahara) as the only solution. Why, then, does he stubbornly reject the Baker Plan, which calls for a 4-5 year period of autonomy followed by a referendum on self-determination?" Characterizing the international support for the Polisario position as favorable, Lahcene said the Polisario was "confident" in its position that "the Baker Plan currently represents the only international consensus on resolving the conflict." Another Polisario spokesman, Khalil Sidi Muhammad, separately accused Morocco of liberating only 30 Sahrawi prisoners, leaving 37 still behind bars. ERDMAN