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Madrid, January 22, 2012
Spain hopes that a “just, lasting and mutually acceptable political solution” to the Sahara issue will be achieved, Spanish Foreign Minister José Manuel Garcia Margallo said.
“We support all efforts made by the Special Envoy of the Un Secretary-General for the Sahara, Christopher Ross, aimed at advancing negotiations between the parties,” Garcia Margallo said in an interview published on Sunday by the Spanish daily “El Pais”.
He added that any solution reached by the parties will be supported by Madrid.
Asked about the non extension of the Morocco-EU fishing agreement by the European Parliament, he described the decision as bad news, especially for the Spanish fishing sector.
Stalemate in UN-led informal negotiations
In April 2007, Morocco presented an Autonomy Plan that was described as “serious and credible” by the Security Council. The said plan proposes significant autonomy for the Sahara with a local government and a parliament, within the Moroccan sovereignty.
The Polisario Front, supported by Algeria, rejects the Moroccan plan and claims the people of the Sahara have the right to self-determination through a referendum.
Over the past two years, Morocco and the Polisario have held 8 informal rounds of negotiations under the auspices of the United Nations Secretary General’s Special Envoy, Christopher Ross.
The last round of negotiations was held in July in New York. All of these negotiations have ended without any progress.
Many analysts voiced their concern that the current informal negotiations over the future of the Sahara are leading nowhere and that the Security Council ought to adopt a new approach in order to put an end to this long-lasting dispute.
