UN Seeks 'Progress' in Western Sahara

By JOHN HEILPRIN – 19 hours ago

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — A U.N. negotiator is brokering talks starting Monday between Morocco and the pro-independence Polisario Front, hoping for "quick progress" in the 32-year dispute over the Western Sahara.

The talks are being held as Western nations try to pressure North African countries to contain their growing violence linked to al-Qaida and radical Islamists.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed hope for a breakthrough from the third such round of talks between the two parties since June, but the Polisario's U.N. representative was pessimistic. Morocco's U.N. mission did not immediately return calls seeking comment.

The discussions are off-limits to reporters.

"This is a painstaking and very complex issue, and I hope that this time they will be able to make quick progress," Ban told reporters Monday at his first press conference of this year.

Officials from Morocco and the Polisario independence movement were scheduled to meet for dinner Monday at a conference center in the secluded Greentree estate in Manhasset, N.Y., that the United Nations sometimes uses for private talks.

The negotiations were due to begin in earnest on Tuesday, and to wrap up on Wednesday.

Ban urged both Morocco and the Polisario guerrillas "to make full use of this week's round of talks to begin moving into a more intensive and substantive phase of discussions."

His special envoy, Peter van Walsum, is mediating the talks under the terms of two U.N. Security Council resolutions last year. The Security Council has voted unanimously to call on the two sides to talk without "preconditions."

Ahmed Boukhari, the Polisario's U.N. representative, said Monday evening that neither side had changed their position and he believed "the chance to make progress is very, very slim."

"We hope that Morocco will abandon their unilateral rhetoric, but so far they're rejecting our proposals and they're trying to persuade and impose their objective on the international community, which is the annexation of our country," Boukhari told The Associated Press by telephone on his way to Manhasset.

Boukhari said the Polisario Front wants Morocco to at least agree to the confidence-building measures they rejected in the last round of talks, including eliminating land mines in Western Sahara and improving the human rights situation.

After Spain's withdrawal from the region as a colonial power, Morocco took over the Western Sahara in 1975. That sparked the fighting between Morocco and the Polisario Front independence group, each vying for control of a desert area rich in phosphate and other resources.

They agreed to a U.N.-brokered cease-fire in 1991, and since then the United Nations has approved $46 million for peacekeeping in the region, including 504 troops, observers and other personnel, according to official figures. At least 15 U.N. personnel have been killed trying to establish peace there.

Morocco never delivered on its promise to hold a referendum on self-determination for the Saharawis in the region, and the Polisario guerrillas, backed by Algeria — Morocco's rival — have threatened to resume fighting with Morocco if the dispute is not resolved.

A series of suicide bombings has rocked Algeria since last year, including an attack in December that killed 17 U.N. staff and 20 others in Algiers.

Associated Press writer Lily Hindy contributed to this report from New York.