How to Create a Stalemate (and Why)

To top off today's posting spree, I would simply like to recommend the latest article by Anna Theofilopoulou, Western Sahara - How to Create a Stalemate. Theofilopoulou is a former UN decolonization specialist that worked on Western Sahara's peace process from 1994-2004. Having followed both the Settlement Plan and Baker's seven-year peace effort from start til finish, she is one of very few to really know the Saharan negotiations game inside out.

As if that wasn't enough, she also happens ot agree with me that with the autonomy initiative,

[...] the current impasse will go on for some more years. Given the absence of will by members of the Security Council to take a clear and determined position and the general preference for "make believe" action, this is quite probable. The UN has had a reasonable plan on the table that met all the specifications laid out by the Security Council to Baker when he was asked in July 2002 to pursue his efforts to find a political solution. It has expressed its readiness to consider any approach that would allow for self-determination. After initially supporting the Baker Peace Plan, the Council changed its position once one of the parties raised objections. Instead of taking a firm position, it vacillated.

I would also add what she hints at but doesn't say: that starting endless, pointless negotiations in order to gain time, is in fact Morocco's first hand-option, and will remain so for as long as the UN will not surrender self-determination as a principle of decolonization. That is, as have written before, precisely the reason for this:

Morocco's current autonomy proposal, while not much different in substance to what was given to Baker in December 2003, follows a different strategy. Claiming to be open to negotiations, it does not go into the details of the previous autonomy project. Instead, it defines the outline and principles governing autonomy, allowing for the proposal "to be enriched by the other parties during the negotiations phase." [...] The conflict has been stuck since 1991 precisely because the two parties cannot agree on the definition of [anything].

Still a great piece. Also check out some of her other articles.