Crunching the numbers

The always well-informed people at ARSO has kindly let me know in the comments to an earlier post, that the situation in the Security Council may be more serious than I thought:

Les USA veulent faire passer dans la résolution - semble-t-il - que les négociations entre Maroc et Front Polisario doivent avoir lieu sur la base de la proposition marocaine d'autonomie, et non pas sans conditions. Le moment est donc tout à fait crucial.

Translation for non-Francophones (not that I'm such a great French speaker myself):

"The US wants to put into the resolution, it seems, that the negotiations between Morocco and Front Polisario must take place based on the Moroccan autonomy proposal, and not without conditions at all. The moment is thus in fact crucial."

If that's true, then yes, this is the day. Or Monday is. But it's strange that they would move ahead so quickly, without preparing the ground for a couple of months first. Then again, the US has been pretty unpredictable as of late.

If this is true, what are the chances of it passing? The following member states are in the SC right now, 5 permanent and 10 non-permanent:

• China - permanent member.
• France - permanent member.
• Russia - permanent member.
• UK - permanent member & president for April.
  
• USA - permanent member.
• Belgium - until 2008.
• Congo-Brazzaville - until 2007.
• Ghana - until 2007.
• Indonesia - until 2008.
• Italy - until 2008.
• Panama - until 2008.
• Peru - until 2007.
• Qatar - until 2007.
• Slovakia - until 2007.
• South Africa - until 2008.

For a political resolution to pass in the Council, it needs nine votes, including all five from the permanent members (a "no" from any of them works as a veto). So where do the individual members stand? Let's sort them out:

Clearly pro-Morocco:

• France - more pro-regime than pro-Moroccan, but in this case, the two coincide. Also, don't forget that the unprecedentedly pro-Moroccan president, Jacques Chirac, is leaving soon, and this would be his last chance to help his Rabat pals along. Whoever comes after will still be pro-Moroccan, but she or he will not have been a close family friend of the Moroccan royals since the 70s, as Chirac is.
  
• USA - apparently. Always vaguely pro-Moroccan, but rarely in such a blatant way as under Bush Jr. Has made two serious attempts to resolve the question for good: the first was the Settlement Plan under Bush Sr, which wanted the thing settled in a fair and no-nonsense way, as quickly as possible; then came Clinton, who took a hands-off approach and let the peace process decay completely. Towards the end of his term, he sent in James Baker, who brought a pro-Moroccan plan that would settle the thing for good, but then when Morocco blocked even that, the US threw up its hands and abandoned the process. Third time the charm?
  
• Indonesia - remember East Timor? No? Well, they do.
  
• Qatar - friendly with Morocco, also in the SC as the "Arab" representative, thus beholden to the pro-Moroccan consensus within the Arab league. As if that's not enough, Qatar relies on US for security and most other things, and is sure to vote with Washington on any issue that doesn't involve its most cherished interests or Israel.
  

Leaning towards Morocco:

• UK - probably belongs in the category above, since they would be very reluctant to block the US in a crucial vote, but they occasionally get queasy about running over small countries. Also, for what it's worth, Labour is in charge, and there are some very pro-Polisario Labour politicians, even if Mr. Blair has been known to ignore them in the past.
  
• Belgium - has a vocal Moroccan community and has seen a lot of Moroccan activism on the Sahara front.
• Congo-Brazzaville - recognized Western Sahara 1978-1996, but froze the recognition for cash. Nowadays, no particular opinion except when visiting dignitaries demand one in their favor. And you know what they say: once a French colony, always a French colony.
  

Clearly pro-Polisario:

• South Africa - next to Algeria, Polisario's strongest supporter today. Will lead the charge, and seems to genuinely enjoy battling former pro-Apartheid states over African issues.
  
• Panama - recognized the exile gov in 1978, still has SADR embassy and is verbally supportive. On the other hand, no great track record on withstanding US pressure.
  

Leaning towards Polisario:

• Russia - well, leaning towards Algeria, really. They couldn't give a flying fuck about Polisario, and has has always had fine relations with Morocco. But they would be idiots not to see that this is a chance to exploit the US failure to support Algeria in its moment of need. Relations with Algiers were strong in the 70s, cooled during the 80s, and virtually ended in the 90s, but since 2000 they've been growing exponentially again thanks to oil & gas cooperation, arms sales and more. Now, by rescuing Algeria's foreign policy from total collapse, Moscow can start to move in as Algeria's main benefactor in an attempt to gain a firm Arab and African foothold again.
• Italy - Romano Prodi's government has been making gas deals with Algeria, and increased cooperation in other areas too. Further, it is forced to lean on a couple of far-left parties who are absolutely militant about third world issues, and have been strongly supportive of Polisario for that reason.
  

Neutral or unknown position:

• China - permanent member. Has been slightly, verbally pro-Moroccan in the past, but is also on a quest for African oil, and has good relations with Algeria. But then of course, there's the little issues of China's own "territorial integrity" too...
  
• Ghana - used to recognize the Sahrawi republic, but today they don't like to get involved. Could be swayed either by French/US pressure/promises, or by South Africa's appeals to pan-African values -- Kwame Nkrumah might be dead, but Ghana still likes to think of itself as an African nationalist pioneer. (If it's any clue that Kofi Annan is ghanaian, perhaps they'll argue for ten more years of squabbling.)
  
• Peru - recognized the SADR 1984-1996, but then suspended relations along with other Latin American governments who said they just wanted to wait for the referendum before they decided (good call, guys). Not hostile to Polisario, but no longer supportive.
• Slovakia - has a surprisingly diligent Western Sahara solidarity movement, but as for the government, I don't have a clue.

And the winner is...

The numbers are on the Moroccan side: if all trends bear out, then it's 7 to 4 in Morocco's favor, with 4 undecided. But then again, Morocco will need nine votes to pass the (possibly) proposed text -- but to block a resolution, Polisario just needs six. Or, as the case may be, only one -- if Russia, or even China, wants to get under Algeria's skirt.

Also to remember, there is a tradition that Western Sahara resolutions are dealt with through consensus -- even if it has been a painfully negotiated consensus most of the time. This has been a main weapon of France to block anything deemed unfavorable to the Moroccan government, without having to formally use its veto, but given the Chiracist perception of "principles", that tradition may end quickly and unceremoniously, if France decides that a demand for consensus would now work against its purposes.

[pic: what do you mean they didn't read it?]

Finally, South Africa can bring one more argument to the table, in support of Polisario: the secretary general's report. It pleased Polisario exactly because it treated its proposal as of equal worth as the Moroccan one, and while it did not envisage a referendum anytime soon, it was strictly neutral between the parties. Even if angry stares from the local behemoths will matter more to most poor third-world states, the secretary-general's opionions could still be important for the swing voters.

As I said, I may not be able to post regularly for some time now, but I'm sure Will will. On this particular topic, readers are encouraged to chip in with their views, especially on what could happen with the unsure votes.

Sign on the dotted line

SPS and APS on the one hand, and MAP on the other, are touting letters by US congressmen to the American government. As usual, they're only reporting the version supporting their own positions. In fact, it turns out that while some 45 congressmen has written a letter in support of Polisario's positions, 169 has come out in favor of the Moroccan government and its autonomy proposal. (For more, see OHOT and Sahara Views.)

This is not the first time the Moroccan lobby scores a success in Congress: another, less explicit but nevertheless very pro-Moroccan, letter was signed in early 2006 by a hundred or so congressmen. That too, was clearly a lobby product, speaking about the increasing Polisario attacks on Mauritania -- a load of crap, certainly, but what do they care? If it gets them their campaign contributions, they'll claim Polisario attacked Algeria. No one in the US gives a shit, or knows about the issue, which is precisely why hiring some PR agencies can be so tremendously effective.

[pic: what algeria considers more important - a MiG 29]

I'm not sure these efforts will have much effect on the administration, since most of the signers (on both sides) would be hard pressed to even find the territory on a map, and have no clue what they've just signed -- the five or so stalwarts on both sides excluded. Should the Bush administration decide to take another line than their own, they won't be making a fuss about it. But it shows how far Morocco has gotten simply by putting some money into lobbying the US, in recognition of the fact that it will be the final arbiter on the issue -- and it shows how far Polisario has fallen behind. Granted, they make heroic efforts with the resources available: just look at the signatures garnered by Mouloud Said, the tireless Polisario representative in Washington. But they simply can't compete. It is a fact that Algeria could counter the Moroccan advances so easily by throwing a handful of its gas millions at the PR agencies, and it wouldn't even make a dent in its budget -- heck, they're buying fighter jets like candy. But as usual, Algeria is too busy crawling up its own ass.

Ultimately, I don't care what Algeria does, but it pains me to see a government hinge its entire diplomatic credibility on an issue, fight it like there was no tomorrow for 30 years, and then lose everything through sheer, pointless negligence. And of course, while the Algerian diplomatic position whithers away under their feet, the Polisario is being dragged down with them -- first, they were press-ganged into signing the Baker Plan; then, left without the necessary support to see it through.

[pic: what morocco considers less important - a casablanca slum]

I'm sure there are many Algerians who feel the same way, even apart from the routine loathing of their cleptocratic government. If Morocco pulls this one off, it won't be because of the Makhzen's suave diplomacy and propaganda -- they're just as thuggishly incompetent and corrupt as their Algerian counterparts, but dedicated enough to at least hire others who will do the job for them. Some may think it fanaticism to spend all that money on fighting a nonsense conflict, while Morocco's socio-economic status is on par with Namibia (on the results here). But, on the Western Sahara front, all that counts is that they are getting things done.

This might bring a rough awakening to Algeria one day, if not Monday already, and the big question then is if the regime will try to rescue the situation through sabre-rattling. Don't count it out: the gang running El Mouradia is not inclined to let those who make them lose face go unpunished, even if it's their own fault.

Postponement of the postponement (updated)

No UN resolution just yet. According to Reuters, the vote has had to be postponed after positions collided in the Security Council, and the resolution is not to be expected until Monday the 30th -- that is, the very last day of the Minurso's mandate.

This means two things:

• It will not simply be a technical rollover resolution again. Or maybe it will, in the end, but at least one side is fighting hard right now to make it something else. The other one could then go for a simple prolongation as its next-best option: that has happened many times before.
  
• If it isn't, it will probably be in favor of Morocco. From the Polisario reaction, recent statements, and the sour face put up by Algeria, it is clear that the US has come out in favor of giving special treatment to the Moroccan proposal, which would be a departure from the UN's established policies of strict neutrality and adherence to self-determination as defined by law. Specifically, the US (and France, bien sûr) wants to insert "wording praising Morocco's 'serious and credible' efforts but merely 'taking note of' the Polisario plan", while South Africa is rallying non-permanent members to block such a resolution. If the Bush-Chirac wording comes through, that would clearly give a partisan slant to the resolution, but by itself, it's no great progress for the Moroccan side -- at least for as long as it isn't complemented by calls to drop the referendum and negotiate on that "serious and credible" effort, and that alone.
  

I might not be able to post much the coming days, for reasons unrelated to a certain contested territory, but I'm sure you'll be hearing more about this.

[updated]

Van Walsum - the movie

Inter City Press, a journalistic organization which does excellent work monitoring the UN, turns out to have sent its correspondent Matthew Russell Lee to the Peter van Walsum press conference previously referenced by Western Sahara Info. Apparently, there's more to the story than we knew, and the UN webcast has plenty of more press conference than has previously been quoted.

ICP calls the meeting "surreal and Kafka-esque" and goes on to explain:

Asked to comment on human rights in Western Sahara, Mr. van Walsum fumbled around trying to find a previous statement of his, or even what he called his "confidential notes," so he'd be sure to go no further than anything he'd previously said. Not to worry -- he said almost nothing, and the spokesperson did not even call on all those reporters raising their hands to ask Mr. van Walsum a question. Video here.

[pic: yes, he sympathizes]

As one persistent correspondent noted, it had taken more than a year to get a briefing from Mr. van Walsum. And then he took only selected questions. What might Mr. van Walsum have said about reports of the beating of human rights campaigner Mohamed Tahlil earlier this week in Laayoune? Nothing, probably...

The Western Sahara issue, on which a draft resolution is slated to be circulated on Monday, inevitably carries with it parallels to the Security Council's major current hot potato, Kosovo. South African Ambassador Kumalo was asked to reconcile his nations support for self-determination for Western Sahara, but opposition to or concern about granting Kosovo independence from Serbia. Even while joking, Amb. Kumalo made this argument: in both cases, South Africa is supporting existing borders.

Well, it's funny because it's true. I will not hazard a judgment on Kosovo's case here -- it's apparently going to be independent no matter what, and probably for the better -- but the South African ambassador's line on respect for borders holds more than a grain of truth.

The press conference opens with van Walsum saying that he's sorry for not having spoken to the media for the duration of his term as special envoy (1½ year), and then explaining that this is the good news -- that he has apologized. The bad news is, as he puts it, that "I will still not say very much". Got that right.

From what he does say, it becomes clear that the MAP's version of the conference, boiled down to what van Walsum said about Algeria's role, was accurate -- if very creatively framed. But even more, it is made abundantly clear from the video that van Walsum is under extreme pressure not to step out of the no-preconditions negotiating framework advocated by the major powers, while at the same time, he cannot ignore the requirements of international law.

When faced with a direct question by the reporter from the Financial Times, on whether he believes that the "people of Western Sahara" has the right to self-determination including the option of independence (i.e, how that right has been defined for every other people), he cannot answer. Instead he launches into an extremely tortured recapitulation of earlier positions, that involves quoting second-hand quotes of his own statements from a 2004 UNSG report. Of course he can't say "no", since that would be blatantly disrespectful of international law and UN resolutions (notably the holiest of holies, GA 1514, and 1541, principle VI and after) -- but neither can he say "yes", since Morocco would then raise hell, and due to the strength of its allies, the mission would temporarily shut down and he could lose his job. Instead he fidgets about nervously, at times dropping completely silent, staring off into space trying to phrase himself through the minefield. In the end, he sneaks out an emergency exit -- he says that the UN cannot forbid a people from chosing something other than independence as its exercise of self-determination, if that is what it desires. But the question, of course, was quite the contrary: can the UN forbid a people from chosing independence, and force it to chose something else? That is, after all, the Moroccan proposition.

All in all, the conference was a sad display in power politics, and of how the powers that be in the Western Sahara issue has got international law by the balls. Read between the lines, and van Walsum is saying two things: Morocco's allies are blocking an implementation of the UN charter, and given the balance of powers, there's nothing I can do about it, so my only remaining hope for a solution -- any solution -- is that Polisario will surrender the rights that I cannot myself strip them of. It's just that simple, just that hard.

And now, my dear Western Sahara nerd, you shall watch the video -- 36 minutes of uncut, action-packed press conference. You know you want to...

[thanks to ARSO for the tip.]

More Mundy

Whatever you do, don't miss Jacob Mundy's analysis of the pros and cons of autonomy, in Foreign Policy in Focus. The core of the reasoning -- obligatory reading, whatever perceptions one has of the conflict -- is the same that Western Sahara Info has been trying to make:

Aditionally, support for independence from Algeria’s executive is at nearly unprecedented levels. As post-conflict Algeria gains in international status and regional power, literally fuelled by soaring hydrocarbon sales, Polisario is more and more confident that it has sided with North Africa’s emerging hegemon. [ . . . ]

The problem of Western Sahara is not that the Moroccan annexation is a fait accompli, which is one of the dominant assumptions driving calls for autonomy. Instead, the determinant reality is that Western Saharan nationalism is growing, not diminishing. Thirty years of exile (for the Sahrawi refugees in Algeria) and socio-economic marginalization (for the Sahrawis under Moroccan administration) have strengthened their resolve, not diminished it. In the streets of Western Sahara, an escalating dialectic of violence is being played out day by day. Protest meets repression meets counter-protest meets police retaliation in an endless cycle. How much longer can Polisario’s leaders justify to their constituents, without losing all credibility, the maintenance of a cease-fire that is now considered pointless by many nationalists? Sooner or later the international community must face this fact, or they will be forced to face it. We can either intervene in a realistic manner or we can, feigning ignorance, let another obscure African conflict deteriorate before our very eyes.

The politics of the least-worst option in Western Sahara are no longer working.

My reds, his eloquence. Now go ahead and read the whole thing, because it's really worth it. Mundy has been providing some of the most in-depth studies there is of the Western Sahara problem, these last years, and this particular piece must be the best analysis of the autonomy option's chances that has been published so far. A little nugget at the end also gives us the title of Mundy's forthcoming book, of which, I am sure, every true Western Sahara enthusiast has had steamy fantasies for some time: Western Sahara: War, Nationalism and Conflict Irresolution. Co-author is prof. Stephen Zunes, and it'll be published on Syracuse Press, any minute now. With some luck the conflict stays unresolved until then, but if you can't wait, here's a piece by Mundy in MERIP from mid-March.

Press cuttings: Algeria's position

[pic: peter van walsum]

According to the Moroccan state newsagency (MAP) the UN secretary general's special envoy, Peter van Walsum, has made some interesting remarks on Algeria's role in the Western Sahara question:

Algeria has in this whole dossier (Sahara issue) played an absolutely preeminent, dominant role ever since 1975", van Walsum, told the press, following the United Nations Security Council's (UNSC) closed hearing on the Sahara issue, opposing the kingdom to the Algeria-backed "Polisario" separatists, who claim the independence of this former Spanish colony, retrieved by Morocco in 1975.

"I have to say it would be totally dishonest if I didn’t mention that they (Algerians) played an important role" in the conflict, he said, noting that "if there is one thing I've learnt in this one year and a half (as a Personal envoy), it is not to try to formulate exactly the role of Algeria," a country that insists "it is not a part in the conflict".

That will not go down well in Algeria, but of course it is true. Algeria is right in refusing to negotiate for Polisario, since that would be completely at odds with the self-determination principle they claim to want to uphold, but it's ridiculous to claim they play no part in the conflict. It is a fact that without Algerian support, Polisario would be done with. Sahrawi nationalism would not disappear, and destroying Polisario will lead to troubles of its own (thousands of armed and disillusioned Sahrawi nationalists let loose in the desert, for one), but if Algeria wanted, it could bring the legal issue to an end over the heads of Sahrawis, by forcing a leadership change in Polisario. That said, there are no indications they want to.

The problem with this interview is ... I can't find it on the UN's site. What I can find is an April 20 press conference by van Walsum where he says many interesting things, but not this. Still, it's a bit too detailed for the MAP to just make it up, though I wouldn't be totally surprised. Here's the meat from van Walsum's press conference:

He [Peter van Walsum] said that, after his first briefing to the [Security] Council last year, he had reminded its members that it had not spoken on the matter in nearly two years and that it had not reacted in any way to Morocco’s rejection of the independence option.

"I thought that was surprising,” he said, adding that perhaps that attitude fit in with the Council’s position that the parties should reach a consensus decision. With that in mind, there had really been only two options: letting the impasse continue indefinitely – a “default option” – or direct negotiations between the two sides. [ . . . ]

“I personally take quite a positive view of these new developments”, he said, pointing out that, even if the proposals were still very far apart part or irreconcilable, the interesting new issue was that both parties were prepared to enter into direct negotiations under the auspices of the United Nations. Inevitably, as one might expect, both plans contained implicit pre-conditions, Morocco insisting that Western Sahara could be an autonomous region operating within a framework set out by Morocco, and Polisario demanding a referendum with an independence option. But the Secretary-General had noted previously that such negotiations would not get off the ground unless the Security Council made it absolutely clear that the exercise of self-determination was the only agreed aim of the negotiations.

This was then summarized by the UN news agency under the inexplicably cheery headline, "UN envoy sees 'window of opportunity' to break impasse".

[pic: abdelkader messahel]

But back to the Algerian view. It is clearly expressed in an interview by the foreign minister delegate for Africa, Abdelkader Messahel, a veteran of Algeria's third world diplomacy, in El Khabar. (El Khabar is Algeria's largest newspaper, independent and often very critical of the government, but it will rarely if ever fall out of line with the Sahara policies.) The interview is originally published in Arabic, but there are also French and English translations available online. (I quote the English version verbatim.) The most interesting part is Messahel's criticism of the USA -- whining about the partisan attitude of France is standard fare, but the US is usually treated more carefully. Says Messahel:

The [secretary general's] report annoyed some superpowers who are to have a heavy weight in April 27th vote. The striking after the issuance of the report is that France and USA sided with Morocco. Algeria recalls them that they are among peace keeping states, and it is so strange that their respective official’s statements fall outside the international legitimacy.

Could the unusually sharp tone be an indication that Messahel fears that the US will cave to the Moroccan position on April 27, when the Council puts together its resolution? There has been some Algeria-USA tension as of late, as is evident in the curious affair of the US terror alert in Algiers, but it's impossible to tell what's going on behind the scenes. Messahel continues, affirming that the Algerian position stays unchanged:

In our opinion, it is a decolonisation process and not an autonomy issue as alleged by Moroccans. It is scheduled in the UN agenda as a decolonisation issue. As for the final situation of the Sahrawi territories, it should be determined on the basis of the self-determination referendum.

He goes on to claim, somewhat downplaying the earlier criticisms, that, "according to close sources, a strong positive reaction has been noticed among all the members" in the April 20 discussions in the Council.

We'll see.

UPDATED: here.

Omar Hadrami and how to write a CV in the Sahara

The invaluably irreverent gossip-machine that is Bakchich has an interesting article in its No. 31:

A few days before the publication of Ban Ki Moon's piece of prose, the [Moroccan] interior ministry, locked down by Fouad Ali El Himma, proceeded to create a Sahrawi unit. This will operate in the shadows of the aforementioned ministry, which, eight years after the dismissal of Driss Basri, remains in control of the Saharan dossier. The exact task of this unit remains a mystery, but looking at its composition, one may fear the worst...

By royal decree of Mohammed VI, three Sahrawi walis -- Mohamed Ali El Admi, Mohamed Rachid Duihi and Khalil Dkhil - have been promoted to the rank of extraordinary walis ["walis détachés"] within the concerned minstry. With respect to the origins of the three men, the tribal balance has certainly been respected, but ... because there's always a but with the Makhzen: one of the men, Mohamed Ali El Admi, is a horrible torturer who served in the 80s in the refugee camps of Tindouf before joining Morocco. Known under the name of Omar Hadrami, he has savagely tortured both Moroccan soldiers who had been taken prisoners by the Polisario Front (who would be happy to do him in today) and Sahrawi prisoners of opinon, for whom he built a torture centre in Tindouf. In short, a reprehensible person who's got a CV just as reprehensible and who figures in the "best of" of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

[shoddy translation from french by western sahara info]

What Mr. Hadrami did between 1972 and 1990

[picture: omar hadrami]

The Omar Hadrami case always was something of a litmus test for both Polisario's and Morocco's propaganda. For Polisario, because they pretended that all was well within the refugee camps during the 1980s, while in fact unsavory characters such as Hadrami ran amok amassing personal power and silencing opposition. He was by all accounts widely feared in the camps, by supporters and detractors alike, and his stature was such that the relationship with secretary-general Muhammad Abdelaziz grew increasingly uneasy. He didn't lose power until the late 1980s, after he faced off with Abdelaziz in an attempt to grab power. The coup attempt led to traumatic disturbances in the camps -- of which Sahrawis are still reluctant to speak -- and in the end Hadrami and his collaborators were defeated and thrown in prison. He was however released relatively quickly, and named representative to Washington; still a very prestigeous post, but far from the centre of power in Rabouni camp. From there, he defected to Morocco. He was immediately promoted to governor and lavished with attention by the court and king Hassan II, and has appeared as its loyal Sahrawi face ever since, meeting with countless visiting delegations to tell his ghastly stories about what he saw happen in the Tindouf refugee camps.

But, thing is, as head of Polisario's military security apparatus, he was himself responsible for most of that abuse. This is rarely mentioned in the Moroccan press, just as Polisario would never have mentioned it while he was on their side. In the MAP's official CV, his Polisario years are left out entirely -- there's a curious gap between his 1972 graduation from a Moroccan university and his 1990 installation as wali. Amnesty International's reports on the conflict regularly feature this sour little line:

Those responsible for human rights abuses in the [Tindouf] camps in previous years continued to enjoy impunity. The Polisario authorities failed to hand over perpetrators still resident in the camps to the Algerian authorities to be brought to justice, and the Moroccan government failed to bring to justice the perpetrators of abuses in the Polisario camps present on its territory.

That's a not-too-veiled reference to Hadrami, and the AI has been even clearer:

"In the Polisario camps there was repression until 1992, says [Amnesty International's Donatella] Rovera." "It improved a lot after 1988 when they recognized this and asked forgiveness of their people." Amnesty maintains that Omar Hadrami, chief of internal security in the Polasario camps, actually was given a job at the interior ministry in Morocco after 1988. "If the Moroccans are serious about cracking down on torture, they should bring Hadrami to trial," Rovera says.

Human rights under Polisario

As for the human rights situation in the Tindouf refugee camps, some serious question marks remain. Most observers seem to agree that the repressive structures that were in place under Hadrami have been considerably liberalized by the 1991 structural reforms of Polisario, where the Front also expressly committed itself to multipartyism and other democratic treats -- after independence. A major Human Rights Watch mission that toured the camps extensively in 1995 -- just a couple of years after Hadrami was purged -- found that despite some problems, the situation was now "satisfactory" (the main exception being abuse of Moroccan POWs). The recent UN fact finding mission stated that there were no complaints of human rights abuse in Tindouf, even if a more thorough look at the situation would be necessary. Amnesty now refers to abuse in the camp almost exclusively in the past tense, noting that the Polisario has not -- contrary to Moroccan allegations -- tried to restrict investigations in camps (rather, "they went out of their way to assist us").

Even so, the clique around Muhammad Abdelaziz remains reluctant to share power, and while dissident voices are tolerated, they are neither encouraged nor given any serious chance to affect decision-making. On the grass-roots level in the camps, there is a decently democratic structure of local councils that run day-to-day business, but the sensitive political, military and economic decisions seem to rest in the hands of a select few. This is hardly out of the ordinary in the Maghreb, and by the standards of both liberation movements and refugee camps, the Tindouf exile republic comes off as positively ultraliberal. But nevertheless, the situation on the ground clashes with Polisario's attempts to construct a media image of itself as a shining beacon of uncorrupted desert democracy, and an increasing number of Sahrawi youths are fed up with the stagnated ruling elite.

The Ould man out

However, there's more in the Bakchich article. It goes on to note that, while we don't know who is behind the appointment of the group -- the inner workings of the Makhzen are no less obscure than, say, the legendarily intransparent Algerian military elite -- it's easy to tell who the move has been directed against. Because there is a name missing from the list: the monarchy's all-time palace Sahrawi, Khelli Henna Ould Errachid.

Now, this could perhaps be because he already has a platform -- the CORCAS council, of which he is the formal head. But, honestly, Khelli Henna never was the one to shy away from salaried titles, was he? No. As Bakchich points out, all three interior ministry Sahrawis are long-standing enemies of Ould Errachid, and this must be interpreted as a move to directly undermine him. Omar Hadrami in particular has long been seen as his main rival, and the two men are said to absolutely loathe each other.

In favor of the favored

[picture: khelli henna ould errachid]

A peculiar twist is added by the fact that both Duihi and Dkhil are former members of PUNS, an organization set up by Franco to act as the territory's only legal party in the dying days of Spanish fascist rule. Established essentially to draw support from Polisario, the PUNS faithfully advocated Spain's line down to the letter: it demanded the independence of Western Sahara under Spanish guidance, longed for "privileged relations" with Madrid, and most of all, it hotly contested any Moroccan or Mauritanian ties to the territory -- for such was Spanish policy right up until the Madrid Agreement. As the Green March approached, the PUNS leadership even declared itself ready to fight a Moroccan entry with arms in hand to preserve Sahrawi independence hand in hand with Spain. Who the leader of the party was? Why, a certain Khelli Henna Ould Errachid -- then the most outspoken defender of a Sahrawi-Spanish alliance against the machinations of both "expansionist" Morocco and "communist" Polisario. Once again something that will not figure in the official biographies.

As Spain began to withdraw -- and made clear to Khelli Henna that he was no longer slated to become Western Sahara's first president -- all three of Franco's Sahrawis suddenly discovered their Moroccan roots. And ever since 1975, they've been paraded as proof that the Sahara always was and always will be Moroccan.

However, as the case of Mr. Hadrami makes abundantly clear, a shared past doesn't necessarily mean a shared future. The palace Sahrawis have been at each others throats ever since, competing for power and privilege. Morocco has always had a policy of encouraging Sahrawi tribalism -- divide and rule -- and the fortunes of its Sahrawi finger puppets have shifted with the mood of the Makhzen, not to mention with the fortunes of competing clans within the Moroccan power structure. For long, Khelli Henna appeared to be the king's go-to-guy, and he has been allowed to amass a huge fortune through semi-legit businesses in El Aaiún (he and his brother -- who formally runs the business empire -- are sometimes called the richest men in the Sahara). But given his less than impressive performance as head of CORCAS, perhaps the monarchy has decided it is time for another spin on the wheel of Sahrawi fortune?

But don't worry. Some things never change -- and should Western Sahara one day become independent, there will be few Sahrawis who will celebrate as loudly as these three. By then with a fresh set of inexplicable gaps in their CV:s.

Hearts and minds (video)

Once again via the Norwegian Support Committee for Western Sahara, who are themselves re-broadcasting it from the Sahrawi Student's Movement (a group active in the occupied territories, south Morocco and at Moroccan universities), we at WSI are proud to premiere that most novel means of communication -- moving pictures.

Below you'll find a video clip of Sahrawi women attempting to hold a small demonstration in occupied Western Sahara (larger version here.). Within seconds of them putting up their banners, police are on the scene. A violent minute later, the demonstration has been broken up, and some of the participants are being hauled off for God-knows-what at the police station. (The headline and caption in Norwegian reads "Demonstrators struck down. See how quickly police arrives, and how they react, when a group of Sahrawi women tries to demonstrate peacefully in Western Sahara".)

Another Amaydane

[picture: Rabab Amaydane]

The Norwegian Support Committee for Western Sahara has been reporting on the Amaydane el-Ouali trial, and they have good coverage of it in English. I particularly recommend this interview with his sister, Rabab, in Verdensmagasinet X, which has been translated by the Committee:

On 12. October last year Rabab and her brother took part in one of the frequent demonstrations in El Aaiun, the capital of Western Sahara.

"We are Sahrawis, not Moroccans!", Rabab recalls that they shouted.
Police forces stormed their house that very evening, torturing every member of the family.

"The police beat my family, and friends of the family, in public", she says. "Our friends were beaten merely for being our friends."

Both Rabab and her brother were taken to the police station.

"I told them how I feel about the occupation. They threatened to rape me – they tried tearing off my clothes, pulled my hair, and hung me by one hand from the ceiling", Rabab relates.

Rabab was released after a day and a half. Her brother was not. El Ouali is still in jail. His sentence will be passed today. [El Ouali was sentenced to five years in prison on April 17 -- WSI]

Calls for help
Rabab is visibly nervous about the outcome of the pending trial, and worried about the maltreatment her brother may be undergoing in police custody. On his last arrest, in 2005, he was so thoroughly beaten in the police car en route to the courthouse that the trial had to be postponed for several weeks. [ . . . ]

She says her brother is seriously ill and in need of medical attention, which he is being denied by the Moroccan police.

Read the rest here.

Also, the trial has already racked up one more victim. As International Herald Tribune reports, the ASVDH activist and former co-prisoner of Amaydane, Muhammad Tahlil, was arrested and beaten on his way to the courtroom, where he had been planning to try to document the trial as a witness. Tahlil has been repeatedly arrested and abused by security forces these last years, and is going in and out of prison like a yo-yo. Amnesty, the US State Department and other international observers have previously drawn attention to his case.

According to the ASVDH,

Mr. TAHLIL, who had his eyes blindfolded and his hands tied, was undressed and subjected to savage beating on all the parts of his body. Then his torturers poured cold water on him before they starting beating him again. Towards 23h00 of the same day, Mr. TAHLIL was taken by his torturers back to the Erraha district, in the east of El-Ayoune, where he was abandoned in his deplorable state.

A later report notes that the indefatigable Mr. Tahlil, after being abandoned beat-up and naked in town, returned to the police station the following evening to claim his confiscated possessions. No such luck: the Moroccans put him in a police van, and drove him to his home town of Boudjdour (on the coast, south of El Aaiún), where they left him with an order not to return to the capital. Good luck with that...

UN SG report: nothing in it

The UN's report collection seems to be online again, and I have now read the Sec-Gen's report, which is now public.

In the report, Ban refuses any comment on the plans by the parties, saying instead they should initiate negotiations without preconditions (at which point they can put forward whatever plans they like). For Polisario, that's more or less fine, since it was the UN's position before too. So, they can stand by their earlier pre-release hype, even if doesn't move them an inch closer to the referendum.

For Morocco, however, it is not fine, since they had hoped for endorsement of the much-vaunted autonomy proposal. It remains to see what the Security Council will do, since much pressure to that end will be applied by France (and the US?).

No other news were in the report. Ban Ki-moon points out that Minurso has no mandate (or resources) to monitor or discourage human rights abuse, but does not recommend that it is given either. He just says that the UN "remains committed" to preventing human rights abuse, which is nice -- but nice doesn't stop torture. He does provide examples of recent human rights abuse, all of it by Morocco against Sahrawis in the occupied territories (and some against subsaharan migrants left to die in the desert), which could perhaps spur a few SC members to ask for a protection mechanism again -- at which point Morocco's own protection mechanism, i.e. France, will surely go into action with a veto vote.

Apart from that, nothing. No new plans, not even a hint of one, and no diplomatic recommendations except that most futile of hopes: to get Morocco and Polisario to negotiate and come to an agreement by themselves. That's not necessarily Ban Ki-moon's fault. It's simply what the UN can realistically do, when it is prevented by the US and France from pushing for the referendum, and by its own committment to international law from dropping its demand for a referendum. The problem, and the guilt, does not lie with the UN's admittedly bureaucratic and frail political mechanisms: it lies squarely with the governments that are consciously blocking its work.

The case of Amaydane el-Ouali

I mentioned in passing in the last post, that eleven Sahrawi protesters have been sentenced to prison as of late. There's a lot of that: one N. ould N. was sentenced to so-and-so many years in prison, and his mother tortured for so-and-so many hours to implicate him in "separatism". But rarely, we see the people behind those news.

So, for once, let's consider the case of one of them: Amaydane el-Ouali, prisoner no. 27771.

Amaydane is young, a kid really. He's 21 years old, and can hardly have any recollections of the war between Morocco and Polisario, which ended in 1991. He would have been four or five years old, when the guns fell silent around his hometown of El Aaiún.

Growing up, he did not encounter much pro-Polisario propaganda, and any and all open Sahrawi dissent was harshly discouraged. Activists of the generation before him were serving long penalties for peaceful protest, horror stories making the rounds about the treatment they faced. In 1992, for example, a 22-year old girl from Smara named Kelthoum was sentenced on forced testimony to 20 years in prison, for handing out leaflets against the occupation. In custody, writes Amnesty International, she had been "held in secret detention, completely cut off from the outside world and without access to her family, lawyers or medical care for 10 months, during which she was allegedly beaten, tortured and sexually abused". A few years later, Amnesty notes similar sentences for youths in their late teens, who had been manifesting peacefully for the right to self-determination. Many others went unreported.

That was the environment Amaydane grew up in. It was some sort of progress, of course: up until the late 1980s, questioning the official line of the Sahara's "Moroccanness" meant, quite simply, death. There would have been no trial, no accusations: there would have been a long jeep drive out into the desert, a bullet in the back of your head, and a shallow grave. And there would have been a discreet message to the family, that for whomever wanted to enquire into your fate, there was plenty of room under the sand for a family grave.

Those things weren't happening any more in the 1990s. People would still be killed, of course, but they were exceptions. More commonly, dissidents were just beaten, tortured and threatened, and, occasionally, sentenced to a couple of decades in prison. From the late 90s, and with king Muhammad VI on the throne from 1999, things started to change more dramatically. The liberalization in Western Sahara was never even near what happened in Morocco, and Western Sahara remains as harshly repressed as, say, Libya, whereas Morocco proper has moved to become one of the less awful states in the Maghreb on human rights issues. But still -- there was progress. Activists were cut some slack, and they took it and ran.

In 1999 -- Amaydane would have been 12 or 13 -- Sahrawi demonstrations erupted in Smara and El Aaiún. They began as social protests, with demands for jobs and fair treatment, but with so many Sahrawis gathered in anti-government manifestations for the first time in years, they quickly escalated into nationalist agitation, and then tit-for-tat stonethrowing violence with the police. The riots were put down quickly and brutally, but for the first time in more than two decades, the independence flag had been flying openly over Western Sahara, and the repressed grievances of a generation burst out into the open. With tens of thousands of ethnic Sahrawi Moroccans forcibly deported south by their government in 1991, to bolster voter rolls in advance of the referendum, and left ever since in squalid camps around El Aaiún, the territory teemed with frustration, poverty and an emergent youth radicalism. The Moroccan army presence was still heavy, with some 150,000 soldiers in the territory, and security services were pervasive, but that, and the exactions and corruption by pro-regime (often non-Sahrawi) settlers installed in positions of economic and political power, only served to widen the gulf between Sahrawis and Moroccans.

This, too, was the environment Amaydane grew up in. And when protest came echoing back time after time, with a resurgent Sahrawi nationalism rising high, he joined in. He is educated in electrical engineering, but probably -- like most young Sahrawis -- unemployed, so like any young man, itching for action. He becomes active in pro-independence activities, especially following the May 2005 unrest, that the Sahrawis call their Intifada of Independence.

He is first arrested in August, in El Aaiún -- where shout-and-run protest continues under the boot of thousands of security reinforcement personnel -- and he is interrogated on his participation in demonstrations. After spending months in detention, he is called to scrutiny before the judge on December 14, 2005, along with among others, Aminatou Haidar and Ali Salem Tamek. By then, he has been injured in the leg. Foreign observers are present, and note him saying that he resents being judged for his opinions, that he is working peacefully for his beliefs, and that he is in favor of Western Sahara's self-determination and eventual independence. He refuses to recognize the signed statements that are used to convict him, and say that they were extracted through torture. In January 2006, his sentence is determined to 12 months in prison, which he serves together with the veteran activists. He joins CODESA, the banned human rights group, and is shown in fotographs chumming with independence icons in their cells -- as if more proof was needed that Moroccan prisons in the territory have turned into veritable academies for Sahrawi nationalism. But it's a tough time, and complaints of abuse at the hands of prison guards seep out via smuggled messages and through family visits all the time. Along with tens of other detainees, Amaydane goes on a hunger strike, and is hospitalized. The authorities chain him to his hospital bed, where he is force-fed to survive. In March 25, 2006, the Moroccan king visits Western Sahara, and Amaydane and many other inmates are pardoned and released to celebrate the event.

In May the same year, the United Nations' human rights commissariat, the OHCHR, visits Western Sahara for the first time in its history. Amaydane is among the activists who sneak past the security cordon and manages to get to the hotel where the delegation -- inexplicably -- stays holed up for the whole duration of the visit. In its report, the OHCHR notes that it

met with lawyers and some of the above mentioned prisoners who had been pardoned by the King in March and April 2006. They raised serious concerns about the fairness of the trial, including the fact that convictions were based exclusively on confessions by the defendants in written police statements. In these statements, defendants implicated themselves in provoking and committing violent acts. Defendants interviewed by the delegation claimed that these confessions had been fabricated and two of them had been extracted under duress, but were nevertheless used during the trial as evidence. Defendants declared their innocence on all charges related to violent disturbances during the trial proceedings. They claimed that they had been advocating peacefully for the right to self-determination of the people of Western Sahara. They consider that the lawsuit against them was of a purely political character, related to their activities in documenting events in Western Sahara, expressing their views on the right to self-determination of the people of Western Sahara, and disseminating this information internationally, including to international human rights organizations, as well as OHCHR.

Perhaps as punishment, on an evening two months later, June 9, 2006, Amaydane is again arrested, together with Hammadi el-Karcha, another of the amnestied political prisoners. They are held at a police station, where they are severely beaten by Moroccan security personnel, until finally released without being charged of any crime, two hours after midnight.

Then again, in early evening August 12, 2006, he and a friend, Jamal el-Hosseini, are stopped by Moroccan special police (the GUS) in El Aaiún. They are driven out in the desert, where the cars team up with agents from the DST, the secret service, and continue further out in the wilderness. The two Sahrawis are relentlessly beaten the whole time, as is evident from photographs of their injuries. They are threatened with a knife by one of the policemen, and told that they should get out of Western Sahara as soon as they could. In the end, they are left naked and wounded, in the desert at night, to find their way back home. Demonstrations by relatives are held in El Aaiún, at which the mothers of both Amaydane and Jamal are said to have been beaten.

Two months later, he's arrested again. The house of his 90-year old relative Mohamed Embarek Amaydane is encircled by some 30 cars from different police units, Sahrawis say, and Amaydane and other members of their family are taken -- but first beaten and roughed up in front of the family, to drive the point home. The house is "searched", smashed up and left in shambles.

On October 15, 2006, Amaydane is brought in front of the judge, then in a miserable state after three days in custody. He is sent to Lekhal, the Black Prison, as it has been called ever since Spanish days, where he remains. He describes physical torture as well psychological, and hearing his fellow inmates screaming in the cells next to his. His trial is repeatedly postponed. When summoned to the courtroom on March 20, he and co-prisoner Bachri ben Taleb refuse to co-operate and instead start shouting the Sahrawi nationalist slogan la badil, la badil, an taqrir al-masir, or "no alternative, no alternative, to self-determination". But yesterday, the verdict fell.

Amaydane will be spending five years behind bars, if there isn't another royal pardon, or, for that matter, a presidential pardon. That means he'll be 26 when he gets out. Meantime, the diplomatic machinery churns and turns and creaks, trying to transform Amaydane, and all the other thousands of Sahrawis who have passed through the gates of the Black Prison, into someone who'll say he's proud to be Moroccan.

I'm not sure they've realised what they're up against.

[pictures: amaydane el-ouali, photographs by friends, family members and activists.]

UPDATE: here.

Mr. Kenilworth goes to Sahara

Via Will, a most interesting piece of news:

Elliot Abrams, the deputy national security adviser for global democracy strategy, is again sowing the seeds of conflict in the Middle East. This time it's in the disputed Western Sahara, under Moroccan control following the end of Spanish colonial rule in 1975.

After being marginalized from the Arab-Israeli arena, now under the almost exclusive domain of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her State Department, Abrams is pulling free the grenade pin that may shortly cause North Africa to explode.

He is on the verge of achieving a major U.S. policy shift that would have Washington backing Morocco's unilateral imposition of its so-called Western Sahara Initiative, or autonomy plan upon the indigenous Sahrawi people of Western Sahara.

U.S. officials distracted by other pressing regional conflagrations first viewed Abrams' Maghreb meddling as a small price to be paid for getting him out of the Arab-Israeli domain. They barely paid attention as Abrams tinkered with a new Western Sahara strategy, an embryonic idea raised by outgoing U.S. ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton (who threatened to do away with the Western Sahara peacekeeping mission, which turned costly over time in the absence of a successful settlement).

Read the rest! And don't miss the prescient Sahara Watch's post on Abram's involvement, from November last year.

The premise of the UPI article, by one Clayton Swisher, is that Abrams has been let loose in Western Sahara as some sort of compensation for being exiled from the Arab-Israeli process. No wonder, if it is so. I'm not one to bash the right, but both under Reagan and Bush Jr, Abrams has consistently brought out the worst aspects of Republican policymaking -- but that's not why he's famous. His claim to fame rests, rather, on his habit of repeatedly and spectacularly botching the long-term execution of his own policies, after spinning off into a neocon fantasyland of unrealistic goals and bloodcurdling methods, all the while refusing to back down to have a rational look at the havoc he's wreaking. The Washington Post, with some understatement, speaks of "ideological zeal and bureaucratic toughness".

Consider for example the following, very incomplete, list of Abramisms :

• Iran-Contra scandal: "in a classic piece of John le Carré intrigue", Abrams travelled the world under the Pythonesque cover name "Mr. Kenilworth", moving money for the Contra guerrilla. He was later convicted of withholding info from Congress, but pardoned by George H. W. Bush.

• Also on the topic of Nicaragua, he was trying his best to derail peacemaking efforts, thinking continued civil war would better serve US positions in the region. This did not exactly win hearts and minds down south.
  

• El Salvador: denying and downplaying the butchery at El Mozote, to buy more time for death squads.

• Chile: mounted a carefully worded, but clearly sympathetic defence of Augusto Pinochet, as late as 1999. Abrams explicitly warned that other rogue rulers could also come to be tried for their crimes, and well, he was right on that count.
  

• In the Middle East, not only did he help stall a cease-fire in in the Israel-Lebanon conflict last summer, provoking anti-American fury all over the Arab world. There's information he even tried to expand the war to include Israeli strikes on Syria. (Joshua Landis claims that regime change in Damascus is something Abrams has been advocating for a long time; and he did sign this report by Islamophobe ranter Daniel Pipes in 2000, noting that a credible threat of war would be the best means to confront Syria.) However, the Israelis, who would actually have to live in the region afterwards, kindly told him to * * * off.
  

• Palestinian territories: promoting a military coup against the first democratically elected Arab government; whatever the flaws of Palestinian politics, and they are many, that kind of approach didn't fly even on the US right -- and would have been sure to set off a civil war (perhaps one that Abrams could then wreck the cease-fire efforts for, this apparently being his main line of expertise).
  

• He even spoke ill of John Lennon!
  

Despite or because of these in most countries career-ending moves, he was appointed in 2005 as one of the USA's top officials overseeing democracy promotion, with a special focus on the Middle East and North Africa. Iran-Contra and death squads to hell, Bush must have thought, because here we have a guy who is on record as arguing for an invasion of Iraq since 1998! If that isn't White House material today, I don't know what is. (Since Abram's appointment, as we all know, democracy in the Middle East has been irresistibly surging. It can only be compared to the heartfelt love for the USA pouring out of Latin America ever since the Reaganite 80s.)

Sahara Watch, in his post, laments "Abram's cynicism". Oh, I wish. The problem with characters such as Abrams is not their cyncism, a word which normally implies some level of hard-headed realism, but rather their unchecked idealism: uneducated on on-the-ground conditions, unconcerned with long-term planning, yet uncompromising on execution. A cynic would be expected to calculate the risks of failure. Elliott Abrams, on the other hand, time after time mistakes brutality and cloak-and-dagger schemes for "realism", all the while promoting the most irrealist of policies, apparently without noticing that they tend to backfire horribly over time. It is telling that the the Bush Sr. administration -- which was nothing if not realist, or even cynical, but in a professional and competent way -- did not let Abrams back into decision-making, even after it freed him of the Iran-Contra charges.

Nothing wrong, I say, in counting armed force and clandestine action among the means of foreign policy, and nothing wrong in sticking to your guns when there are important policy goals at stake. But violence and single-mindedness will never by themselves substitute for good planning and sensible ambitions. In fact, it will only accentuate the flaws of faulty or nonexistent planning -- something made all too clear by the mega-débacle now unfolding in Iraq. If Elliott Abrams has really taken the reins of US Maghreb policy, then we're in for a wild ride. And if his track record is anything to go by, the casualties will not only be maghrebine civilians, but are certain to include a few of those US policy goals he'll be claiming to defend.

OTHER NEWS:

• ASVDH reports more sentences of demonstrators in El Aaiún, with a second batch of protesters to face trial soon. All in all, eleven Sahrawis have recently been condemned to between five months and five years in prison, for various crimes relating to street protests, displaying illegal symbols (the Western Sahara flag) and "disturbing the order".
  

• The Secretary-General's report has finally been made official, but the UN documentation library web is down.

• Also: don't miss The Arabist's fascinating post on sand storms. He writes mostly of the Egyptian khamsin, but there's plenty of of sand flying around in Western Sahara too, so it qualifies for inclusion here.

Polisario happy with Ban Ki Moon report

[Note that the last post on the terrorist attacks in Morocco and Algeria has been updated with more links.]
With Morocco's autonomy plan and Polisario's referendum plan both up for discussion in the Security Council in three days, the usual pre-report ping-pong game of accusations has started.

Morocco bemoans Algeria's "hasty and violent reaction" to its initiative, and especially complains about its use of "erroneous and unfounded data". It is unclear, though, what this refers to, if anything. It may simply be the Polisario counter-plan, but that includes no new information of any sort (and hardly any new proposals). Algeria has so far been very muted in its reaction, with the most high-level statement issued so far being foreign minister Bedjaoui's remarks in Moscow, that "a solution, like the one envisioned by Morocco, of internal autonomy in the framework of pre-affirmed Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara, could not be supported by the Security Council without seriously violating the international legality, to which the UN is strongly attached". That all strikes me as rather unremarkable.

Ban Ki Moon's first report

Meanwhile, Polisario is displaying some satisfaction with the secretary general's report to the SC. It hasn't been made official yet, but the parties to the conflict are privy to its content. Muhammad Abdelaziz calls it "balanced" and chief negotiator Emhamed Khaddad is "satisfied". Abdelaziz especially mentions that the report will bring up human rights, and Khaddad points out that both Morocco's and Polisario's plans are given equal attention, which supposedly counts as a success. But there's little else of substance in their comments, and in any case, the important thing is not what the SG writes, it is how the Council receives it.

[pic: muhammad abdelaziz]

When making the customary reference to the region being thrown into war, Abdelaziz uses somewhat blunter language than we've grown used to these last years -- like the word "war" -- and he says to Sawt al-Ahrar (a pro-FLN Algerian newspaper) that there is "no other option than a return to armed struggle", if there is no self-determination referendum. But as usual, there's been very little movement to back that up -- no military drills, no nothing, even for the look of it. Morocco has made no comment on the report so far. We'll see what's in it when it's made public -- it will be somewhat significant not just because of the rival plans, but also because it's Ban Ki Moon's first.

Better late than never

Abdelaziz also called for the UN to stop suppressing the report of its OHCHR visiting mission, which remains unpublished after more than five months. The report -- the first UN human rights inspection of Western Sahara ever -- was harshly critical of Morocco's treatement of civil protest in the occupied territories, and explicitly linked the abuses to the decades-long denial of self-determination for Western Sahara's people. At the same time, it generally avoided criticism of Polisario's Tindouf government, saying only that there were no complaints, but that the situation could warrant closer inspection. Significantly, it argued for permanent human rights monitoring of both parties to the conflict:

3. Closer monitoring of the human rights situation both in Western Sahara and in the refugee camps in Tindouf is indispensable. The United Nations should explore with all relevant actors the best way to ensure adequate and continuous monitoring of the human rights situation in the region, and to offer effective capacity building, protection and redress. All concerned should fully cooperate with the United Nations in the implementation of this task.

This is something that Polisario has long argued for, since it (a) believes that it will come off much better than Morocco under any inspection regime and (b) bases its entire forward strategy on civil rights activism in the occupied territories, ever since the 2005 "intifada" broke out, and (c) Morocco is at the same time trying to construct a new relationship with the West, based on being the "Good Arab" with regards to human rights and democracy, which makes it especially vulnerable to exposure of the hassanesque brutality still going on down south.

The full OHCHR report has long been available on the web, leaked by both parties, but only now has the the Financial Times picked it up, in an article published just in time for the SC discussions. The author, Mark Turner, notes cites an "official familiar with the process" saying that there is "some disappointment within the system at a perceived sweeping of Sahrawi rights under the table". That's quite the understatement: at the last Council meeting on Western Sahara, all member states but France wanted to expand Minurso's mandate to cover human rights. But veto rules rule, and the proposition fell, thanks only to Morocco's most unquestioning ally. This disgraceful result -- there can hardly be a question of partiality if both sides are monitored by the same UN agency -- could come up for review again this time. Perhaps that is even why Muhammad Abdelaziz is looking so smug?

[pic: m6 & chirac -- two hearts beat as one]

No endgame just yet

On the other hand, the FT also notes what appears to be "a swing in US favour towards the Moroccan side", with comments on the autonomy plan getting ever more encouraging as the day of reckoning approaches. No use in speculating in what the results will be, but let's just remember that it mustn't necessarily be an either/or choice. The decision of April 27 could very well leave both parties complaining of betrayal. It seems unquestionable that the UN will prolong the Minurso mandate, in the hope of credible Moroccan-Polisario negotiation over one or both of the plans; but what happens after that, if those talks haven't materialized at the end of the next extension, is another question.

Bomb blogging - updated

Even if not in the slightest related to Western Sahara, it would be obscene not to comment on the bloodshed that is taking place in Algeria and Morocco right now, but I'm afraid most sensible things have already been said: we can just hope it stops.

For some reading and blog debate on the murderous blast in Algeria, and the -- fortunately! -- less lethal string of suicide attacks in Casablanca, I recommend the excellent group blog 'Aqoul. Blog profile The Lounsbury, of equally sharp wit and foul mouth, had his Casablanca hotel breakfast interrupted by a large bang this morning, and, as usual, he has much to say about it. There was also a debate where yours truly made some input on the Algerian bomb right before -- and let's not forget the blog authors' efforts to set up a compensation fund for Mr. Muhammad Faiz, the unlucky owner of an Internet café in Casablanca, who was among the first victims of the attacks in Morocco, and whose intervention may have saved the lives of many. Any wealthy would-be donors out there, step up and chip in to give the man the recognition he deserves -- and a chance to rebuild his shattered business.

Apart from 'Aqoul, there's also some input over at the normally more Mashreq-centered Abu Aardvark, from where we are also pointed to a piece by George Joffe at The Guardian's Comment is Free.American-Algerian blogger The Moor Next Door has posted on the attacks in Algiers, and American-Moroccan author and blogger Laila Lalami writes about the events in Morocco.

Words, words, words, I know. But recent events, from GSPC's merger with al-Qaida to these bombings, do take some serious talking, and needs to be figured out. For though this be madness, yet there is a method in't.

-- -- -- --

UPDATE: More on Abu Aardvark; some on American Footprints; a little on the View from Fez; and Global Terror Alert has an English translation of the GSPC/al-Qaida communiqué accepting responsibility for the Algiers bombs, as well as a number of other attacks and battles with the security forces.

Beyond the blogosphere, the CS Monitor has a piece on how the terrorist attacks, and Islamism more generally, may affect the Moroccan reform project. Amnesty condemns the attacks in Algiers, and also offers a death figure for all of 2006 (some 300 dead, incl. 70 civilians), which I hadn't seen before. The UN Security Council and Secretary General chimed in on the condemnation.

Algeria itself stays true to form by finding an external enemy to focus its anger on, although this time in a somewhat convoluted way. Additionally, according to both Liberté (French) and El Khabar (English) the interior ministry is now claiming that there were remote detonators in a bomber's car, hinting that he didn't know what was about to go down. It's unclear whether this is a government ploy to bring home some hard-to-detect propaganda point about Algerians not being suicide bombers, or if it really is what the investigations have found.

The Jamestown Institute has some info on the government offensive against GSPC/al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, from before the attack -- an offensive which, in my humble opinion, is a far more likely trigger for the bombings than bin Ladin ordering them from his caves in Waziristan; and the Counterterrorism Blog (so named with no apparent irony) seems to agree, but I'm not sure whether that strengthens my case. Finally, for some much-needed comic relief: a golden oldie from One Hump Or Two.

Polisario's plan - full text and comments

The last post contained the full text of Morocco's plan for autonomy. This is the Polisario Front's plan for, you guessed it: not autonomy. Comments by Western Sahara Info in red. (Source for the plan is again Sahara-Update. What would we do without them.)

PROPOSAL OF THE FRENTE POLISARIO FOR A MUTUALLY ACCEPTABLE POLITICAL SOLUTION THAT PROVIDES FOR THE SELF-DETERMINATION OF THE PEOPLE OF WESTERN SAHARA (Official translation)
[Note the UN vocab. In resolution after resolution, the Security Council has been calling for "a mutually accepted solution that provides for the self-determination of the people of Western Sahara". The plan itself is, as noted, mostly rehashing old positions, but it does so with considerable legal and rhetorical flair. For being a last-minute move by the Polisario, if that's what it is, it's very well argued.]

[presented to UN Secretary General on April 10 2007]
[They just can't resist pointing out they beat Morocco by a day, can they?]

I / The Conflict of Western Sahara is a decolonisation question:
[Contrast and compare with Morocco: Polisario's document is so laden with UN resolution code, it's nearly unreadable. But this is an undeniable strength of the plan: whatever flimsy proposals it brings up next (we'll see), it is simply undeniable that international law and the UN's resolutions are, as Morocco would've put it, "in the separatist camp".]

1. Included since 1965 on the list of the Non-Self-Governing territories of the UN Decolonisation Committee, Western Sahara is a territory of which the decolonisation process has been interrupted by the Moroccan invasion and occupation of 1975 and which is based on the implementation of the General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV) regarding the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples.

2. The UN General Assembly and the Security Council have identified this conflict as a decolonisation conflict between the Kingdom of Morocco and the Frente POLISARIO whose settlement passes by the exercise by the Saharawi people of their right to self-determination.

3 Likewise, the International Court of Justice, at the request of the General Assembly has clearly ruled, in a legal opinion dated 16 October 1975, that “the materials and information presented to it do not establish any tie of territorial sovereignty between the territory of Western Sahara and the Kingdom of Morocco or the Mauritanian entity. Thus the Court has not found legal ties of such a nature as might affect the application of General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV) in the decolonization of Western Sahara and, in particular, of the principle of self-determination through the free and genuine expression of the will of the peoples of the Territory”.

4. Furthermore, on 29 January 2002, at the request by the Security Council, the UN Legal Counsel clearly established that Morocco was not the administering power of the territory, that the Madrid Agreement of 1975 dividing the territory between Morocco and Mauritania did not transfer any sovereignty to its signatories and, finally, that the status of Western Sahara, as Non-Self-Governing Territory, had not been affected by this agreement.
[This refers to the Hans Corell verdict which was originally concerned with natural resource exploitation, but ended up delving deep into the legal status of the territory. The ruling on exploitation (and in particular exploration) was considerably more nuanced than Polisario likes to admit, but on the sovereignty/administration side, it's a slam dunk refutation of Moroccan claims.]

II / The solution of the conflict passes by the holding of a referendum on self-determination:

5. The question of Western Sahara having been identified by the International Community as a decolonisation question, the efforts aiming to settle it have consequently and naturally been guided by the objective of offering the people of this territory the opportunity to decide their future through a free and fair referendum on self-determination.

6. The Settlement Plan approved by the two parties to the conflict, the Kingdom of Morocco and the Frente POLISARIO, and by the Security Council in its resolutions 658 (1990) and 690 (1991), complemented by the Houston Agreements negotiated and signed in September 1997 by the Kingdom of Morocco and the Frente POLISARIO, under the auspices of James Baker III, Personal Envoy of the UN Secretary-General, and endorsed by the Security Council as well as the Peace Plan for Self-determination for the People of Western Sahara or Baker Plan approved by the Security council in its resolution 1495 (2003), all provide for the holding of a referendum on self-determination in Western Sahara. All these efforts failed because of the reneging of the Kingdom of Morocco on its international commitments.
[Well, in the early nineties, Polisario weren't always very helpful in Settlement Plan negotiations either, but largely true.]

III / Readiness of the Frente POLISARIO to negotiate with a view to holding the referendum on self-determination and the granting of post-referendum guarantees to Morocco and to Moroccan residents in Western Sahara:
[This serves more or less the same purpose as Morocco's "readiness to negotiate" on its own plan: taking the moral high ground by seeming to compromise, while not doing it; and trapping the other party in negotiations within a preferred legal/political context. Still, it is somewhat significant since Polisario has been reluctant to start bilateral negotiations now, since that would seem to imply abandoning the Baker Plan. But by themselves calling for negotiations on the UN's established position (the referendum), but not on anything outside of it (as Morocco proposes), they step back into the game.]

7. The Frente POLISARIO that unilaterally declared a cease-fire which it has ever since respected scrupulously, and that accepted and implemented in good faith the Settlement Plan by virtue of which the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) was deployed as well as the Houston Agreements, and that has honoured all the commitments it has undertaken by making concessions sometimes painful in order to offer to the Saharawi people the opportunity to freely decide their destiny, reiterates solemnly its acceptance of Baker Plan and declares its readiness to negotiate directly with the Kingdom of Morocco, under the auspices of the United Nations, the modalities for implementing it as well as those relating to the holding of a genuine referendum on self-determination in Western Sahara in strict conformity with the spirit and letter of the UN General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV) and within the format envisaged in the framework of Baker Plan, namely the choice between independence, integration into the Kingdom of Morocco and self-governance.

8. The Frente POLISARIO is also committed to accepting the results of the referendum whatever they are and to already negotiate with the Kingdom of Morocco, under the auspices of the United Nations, the guarantees that it is prepared to grant to the Moroccan population residing in Western Sahara self-determination would lead to independence.
[So, this is the new element introduced by this plan: details on guarantees to Moroccans in Western Sahara. Hardly a major concession, or a concession at all, but still something that has to be done sooner or later.]

9. The guarantees to be negotiated by the two parties would consist in:

9.1 : the mutual recognition of and respect for the sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of the two countries in accordance with the principle of the intangibility of the borders inherited from the independence period;
[Important but not new. This would actually represent a concession by Morocco, not Polisario, since Morocco is the only state in Africa which has refused to accept the inviolability of colonial borders, a principle sacred to the OAU and African Union (for reasons obvious to anyone who has considered what a green light to secessionist movements would do with the map of Africa). Or at least it's the only African government to refuse it since Somalia's claim to Ogaden disapperared along with Somalia in 1992...]

9.2 : the granting of guarantees concerning the status and the rights and obligations of the Moroccan population in Western Sahara, including its participation in the political, economic and social life of the territory of Western Sahara. In this respect, the Saharawi State could grant the Saharawi nationality to any Moroccan citizen legally established in the territory that would apply for it;
[Could or would? I'm sure they would have no trouble granting citizenship to those sympathizers who are original Moroccan citizens from within Morocco -- like Ali Salem Tamek -- but what happens to anti-Polisario Moroccan Sahrawi settlers, or non-Sahrawi Moroccans? Of course they could grant citizenship to anyone, Moroccans or martians, but what criteria are to be used for determining whether they would? If this is supposed to represent the "news" in Polisario's plan, then there are no news. As an aside, I note that Polisario officially prefers "Saharawi". I'll think about it, but in the meantime, score one to Will.]

9.3 : the agreement on equitable and mutually advantageous arrangements permitting the development and the joint exploitation of the existing natural resources or those that could be discovered during a determined period of time;
[Now, here's something. Morocco is offered a share in natural resource exploitation, a tradition with roots back to the Madrid Agreement. Also, the resources that "could be discovered during a determined period of time" clearly refers to oil. Together with Morocco's odd refusal to fully hand over the natural resource proceeds, this makes one think: is it possible that both Polisario or Morocco know something we don't, or do they just suspect that the other side does? Either way, this is a very real and tangible concession, since even modest oil finds would be of huge importance for a small population such as Western Sahara's after independence.]

9.4 : the setting up of formulas of partnership and economic cooperation in different economic, commercial and financial sectors;

9.5 : the renunciation by the two parties, on a reciprocal basis, of any compensation for the material destructions that have taken place since the beginning of the conflict in Western Sahara;
[Again, a real concession, although it is unlikely that Polisario would ever have gotten any such compensation, or indeed, that they would have preferred to press the claim over healing relations with Morocco. So, important, and a psychologically sensitive topic among the refugees, but not a particularly big concession strategically.]

9.6 : the conclusion of security arrangements with the Kingdom of Morocco as well as with the countries of the region that may be interested;

9.7 : the commitment of the Saharawi State to work closely with the Kingdom of Morocco as well as with the other countries of the region with a view to bringing to conclusion the integration process of the
Maghreb;

9.8 : the readiness of the Saharawi State to participate with Morocco and the countries of the region in the maintenance of peace, stability and security of the whole region in the face of the different threats
that could target it.

Likewise, the Saharawi State would positively consider any request from the United Nations and the African Union to participate in peace-keeping operations.

10. The Frente POLISARIO is ready, under the auspices of the United Nations and with the approval and the support of the Security Council, to enter in direct negotiations with the Kingdom of Morocco on the basis of the aforementioned parameters with a view to reaching a just, lasting and mutually acceptable political solution that provides for the self-determination of the people of Western Sahara in conformity with the relevant resolutions of the United Nations mainly the General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV), thus bringing about peace, stability and prosperity for the whole region of the Maghreb.

Morocco's plan - full text and comments

It now seems to be official. Below is the plan presented to the UN Security council by the Kingdom of Morocco, along with its complementary documents. The occasional spelling error gives reason to suspect its not an official translation, but it's certainly good enough; I have taken the liberty to correct those, and bring capitalization in line with my particular tastes.Comments by Western Sahara Info are in red, and don't miss Polisario's counter-plan getting the same treatment in the next post. (Source: Sahara-Update)

His Excellency Mr. Ban Ki-moon
Secretary-General
United Nations Organization

Mr. Secretary-General,

The Kingdom of Morocco has been working with determination and in good faith for the settlement of the Sahara dispute, in the best interest of all Maghreb States, and for the sake of regional security and stability. It has thus constantly and earnestly supported United Nations efforts to reach a final, negotiated settlement.

Given that it was impossible to implement the previous proposals made to resolve the dispute, the situation has remained deadlocked. Thus, the Security Council has been calling, since 2004, for efforts to break the impasse, and to reach a political, mutually acceptable solution.

Responding this call, I have the honor to send you a document containing the “Moroccan Initiative for negotiating an autonomy statute for the Sahara Region“. Within the framework of the Kingdom’s sovereignty, national unity and territorial integrity.

This is an innovative, responsible and open compromise initiative which, by virtue of its substance as well as its overall objectives, makes it possible for all Sahrawis, those inside as well as those outside the region, to run their affairs democratically, through various representative legislative, executive and judicial bodies.

The initiative achieves the principle of self-determination, through a free, modern and democratic expression regarding the autonomy statute. As such, it is in conformity with international legality as well as with international norms and standards applicable in area of autonomy. It guarantees compliance with-and promotion of- human rights as they are universally recognized, and as they are enshrined in the Moroccan Constitution.

The kingdom of Morocco strongly believes that this proposal, which can serve as a basis for dialogue, negotiation and compromise, will give new momentum to the UN process for the settlement of this dispute.

In this connection, the Kingdom of Morocco expresses its readness to engage resolutely in serious, in-depth negotiations with the other parties, with a view to contributing to the achievement of final, mutually acceptable political solution long awaited by the International community.

Building on democratic process and on intensive internal consultations, which were enhanced by discussions at international level, Morocco is hereby responding to the International community, by accepting to engage in thorough and detailed negotiations on the various aspects of this initiative. My country hopes the other parties will be guided by the same political will and earnest commitment to resolve this dispute, once and for all, and to promote peace, security and stability in an endangered geopolitical environment. Such a development would fulfill the aspirations of the peoples of the Maghreb, and contribute to the emergence of a stable, prosperous, democratic and solidarity based Arab Maghreb Union that would be an active player dedicated to African solidarity, as well as a credible interlocutor for all its partners in the region.

By sending you the document introducing this initiative, the Kingdom of Morocco is confirming its commitment to the lofty ideas enshrined in the UN Charter. The Moroccan people, all segments and persuasions included, pin great hopes on the efforts yourself and your Personal Envoy will exert to convince the other parties to seize the chance for peace brought by this initiative, and to appreciate all it has to offer in terms of shaping a better future for the region, and promoting stability, security, democracy and prosperity therein.

I request that you kindly circulate this letter, along with the attached document, and that you append them to your next report to the Security Council.

Yours sincerely

MOROCCAN INITIATIVE FOR NEGOTIATING AN AUTONOMY STATUTE FOR THE SAHARA REGION

I. Morocco’s commitment to a final political solution
[The whole of § I is about summarizing the rest of the proposal and underlining the generousness of Morocco -- come on, I've got twelve handicapped kids at home! It is notable only for how light it is on international law, more or less skipping over four decades of painstakingly written UN peace plans and resolutions, and instead starting the clock at 2004, just after Morocco refused the Baker Plan. Readers are advised to similarly skip the rah-rah and go straight to the hard core of the proposal, in § II and below.]

1. Since 2004, the Security Council has been regularly calling upon “ the parties and states of the region to continue to cooperate fully with the United Nations to end the current impasse and to achieve progress towards a political solution” .

2. Responding to this call by the international community, the Kingdom of Morocco set a positive, constructive and dynamic process in motion, and pledged to submit an autonomy proposal for the Sahara, within the framework of the Kingdom’s sovereignty and national unity.

3. This initiative is part of the endeavors made to build a modern, democratic society, based on the rule of law, collective and individual freedoms, and economic and social development. As such, it brings hope for a better future for the region’s populations, puts an end to separation and exile, and promotes reconciliation.

4. Through this initiative, the Kingdom of Morocco guaranties to all Sahrawis, inside as well as outside the territory, that they will hold a privileged position and play a leading role in the bodies and institutions of the region, without discrimination or exclusion.

5. Thus, the Sahara populations will themselves run their affairs democratically, through legislative, executive and judicial bodies enjoying exclusive powers. They will have the financial resources needed for the region’s development in all fields, and will take an active part in the nation’s economic, social and cultural life.

6. The state will keep is powers in the royal domains, especially with respect to defense, external relations and the constitutional and religious prerogatives of His Majesty the King.

7. The Moroccan initiative, which is made in an open spirit, aims to set the stage for dialogue and a negotiation process that would lead to a mutually acceptable political solution.

8. As the outcome of negotiations, the autonomy statute shall be submitted to the populations concerned for a referendum, in keeping with the principle of self-determination and with the provisions of the UN Charter.

9. To this end, Morocco calls on the other parties to avail the opportunity to write a new chapter in the region’s history. Morocco is ready to take part in serious, constructive negotiations on basis of this initiative, and to contribute to promoting a climate of trust.

10. To achieve this objective, the Kingdom of Morocco remains willing to cooperate fully with the UN Secretary-General and his Personal Envoy.

II . Basic elements of the Moroccan proposal
[This is where you need to start paying attention.]

11. The Moroccan autonomy project draws inspiration from relevant proposals of the United Nations Organization, and from the constitutional provisions in force in countries that are geopolitically and culturally close to Morocco. It is based on internationally recognized norms and standards.
[Sorry, wrong paragraph. Now.]

A . Powers of the Sahara Autonomous Region

12. In keeping with democratic principles and procedures, and through legislative, executive and judicial bodies, the populations of the Sahara Autonomous Region shall exercise powers, within the Region’s territorial boundaries, mainly over the following :
• Region’s local administration, local police force and jurisdictions;
• in the economic sector, economic development, regional planning, promotion of investment, trade, industry, tourism and agriculture;
• Region’s budget and taxation;
• infrastructure; water, hydraulic facilities, electricity, public works and transportations;
• in the social sector; housing, education, health, employment, sports, social welfare and social security;
• cultural affairs, including promotion of the Saharan Hassani cultural heritage;
• environment.
[Local police force, budget and taxation -- those are big ones for an autonomy.]

13. The Sahara Autonomous Region will have the financial resources required for its development in all areas. Resources will come, in particular, from:
• taxes, duties and regional levies enacted by the Region’s competent authorities;
• proceeds from the exploitation of natural resources allocated to Region;
• the share of proceeds collected by the State from the exploitation of natural resources located in the Region;
• the necessary funds allocated in keeping with the principle of national solidarity.
• proceeds from the Region’s assets.
[Taxation, check. But the part on natural resources leaves much to the imagination, which isn't very promising. It says nothing about exactly how much will be returned to the region, or how much the state will chose to exploit and take a share of. This must be intentional, considering how much noise Polisario has been making about Moroccan exploitation of phosphate resources and fisheries. Since Morocco isn't exploiting the BuCraa phosphate fully even today, and could probably do without the fish, it could easily just have said that all resources will go back to the territory. Leaving such an easy and expected concession out must be, will be and should be interpreted, by both sides, as that they're not going to let Western Saharans keep all the proceeds. Could this mean that Morocco is still holding out for an oil find?]

14. The State shall keep exclusive jurisdiction over the following in particular;.
• the attributes of sovereignty, especially the flag, the national anthem and the currency;
• the attributes stemming from the constitutional and religious prerogatives of the King, as Commander of the Faithful and Guarantor of freedom of worship and of individual and collective freedoms;
• national security, external defense and defense of territorial integrity;
• external relations
• the Kingdom’s juridical order
[Well, I'd red flag this paragraph right away. The "constitutional prerogatives" of the King are very far-reaching, giving him the right to circumvent the constitution more or less at will, so this provision could potentially strike down anything that the autonomus region wants to do. It could be corrected by saying that the King will need consent from the local Head of State to override measures that pertain specifically to Western Sahara, but such an article would be extremely sensitive for Morocco, since they would call into question the holy primacy of the monarch. The regime certainly doesn't want to open debate on the monarchic system, at the same time as it's starting a potentially awkward regionalization debate (with the Rif etc quite likely to follow suit asking for autonomy within years). This is the downside of trying to install a republic within a monarchy.]

15. State responsibilities with respect to external relations shall be exercised in consultation with the Sahara Autonomous Region for those matters which have a direct bearing on the prerogatives of the Region. The Sahara Autonomous Region may, in consultation with the Government, establish cooperation relations with foreign Regions to foster inter-regional dialogue and cooperation.
[Could the first sentence be a hint at allowing the Sahara's ex-Polisario element some measure of privileged relations with Algeria? Just a thought.]

16. The powers of the State in the Sahara Autonomous Region, as stipulated in paragraph 13 above, shall be exercised by a Representative of the Government.
[Fucking goons, you mean paragraph 12. At least try to make it look like a finished proposal.]

17. Moreover, powers which are not specifically entrusted to a given party shall be exercised by common agreement, on the basis of the principle of subsidiarity.
[Common agreement as in both sides need to approve? That would be a valuable concession, since unforeseen issues often pop up to make or break constitutions. But if it's not in the text, it's not in the proposal.]

18. The populations of the Sahara autonomous Region shall be represented in Parliament and in the other national institutions. They shall take part in all national elections.

B. Bodies of the Region

19. The Parliament of the Sahara Autonomous Region shall be made up of members elected by the various Sahrawi tribes, and of members elected by direct universal suffrage, by the Region’s populations. There shall be adequate representation of women in the Parliament of the Sahara Autonomous Region.
[Well, flipping the tribal card has always been Morocco's way of playing. But the paragraph remains very sketchy. First, this thing about "elected by tribes" could mean just about anything; second, there is no hint on the numbers or proportions of MP:s. Would tribal designees outnumber the directly elected members? Is the parliament supposed to have two chambers? Also, if they're going to appeal to tribalism, it begs the question whether the large and powerful tribes (say the reguibat and tekna confederations, which together make up the overwhelming majority of inhabitants) will get more representation than some puny ex-znaga (semi-slave status) tribe? That's how the Spanish did in setting up the Djema'a in the 70s. That all depends on who you want to bring aboard the bandwagon, but if you're appealing to tribal leaders, they might want to know. Lastly, props for including a women's quota.]

20. Executive authority in the Sahara Autonomous Region shall lie with a Head of Government, to be elected by the regional Parliament. He shall be invested by the King. The head of Government shall be the Representative of the State in the Region.
[Another red flag. Note: elected by the parliament. Not by the population. The head of state will be an important character, and by making him dependent on the parliament, the composition of which has yet to be detailed, Morocco keeps plenty of means to block any uncomfortable president-elect.]

21. The Head of Government of Sahara Autonomous Region shall form the Region’s Cabinet and appoint the administrators needed to exercise the powers devolving upon him, under the present authority Statute. He shall be answerable to the Region’s Parliament.

22. Courts may be set up by the Regional Parliament to give rulings on disputes arising from enforcement of norms enacted by the competent bodies of the Sahara Autonomous Region. These courts shall give their rulings with complete independence, in the name of the King.

23. As the highest jurisdiction of the Sahara Autonomous Region, the high regional court shall give final decisions regarding the interpretation of Region’s legislation, without prejudice to the powers of the Kingdom’s Supreme Court or Constitutional Council.
[Okay, so power ultimately stays with the Moroccan courts, the proposal just adds a Sahrawi middle layer.]

24. Laws, regulations and court rulings issued by the bodies of the Sahara Autonomous Region shall be consistent with the Region’s autonomy Statute and with the Kingdom’s Constitution.
[As expected, the Moroccan constitution will override anything the Sahrawi parliament comes up with.]

25 . The Region’s populations shall enjoy all the guaranties afforded by Moroccan Constitution in the area of human rights as they are universally recognized.
[Oh, they don't already?]

26. An Economic and Social Council shall be set up in the Sahara autonomous Region. It shall comprise representatives from economic, social, professional and community groups, as well as highly qualified figures.
[What? Okay, whatever. Probably some patronage-salary thingy.]

III. Approval and Implementation procedure for the autonomy statute

27. The Region’s autonomy statute shall be the subject of negotiations and shall be submitted to the populations concerned in a free referendum. This referendum will constitute a free exercise, by these populations, of their right to self determination, as per the provisions of International legality, the Charter of the United Nations and the resolutions of the General Assembly and the Security Council.
[Ahh, this is the money shot. Here is where the referendum as hitherto defined by the UN goes out the window, and is replaced by a yes or yes to Moroccan rule -- note that it is the referendum itself that constitutes the self-determination, not the "yes" vote of the populations concerned. Of course it will be a "yes," since the Moroccan government has a 100% vote winning record in its own territory, but even if the Sahrawis gave a landslide "no", they would still have had their self-determination moment. End of conflict, end of story, please move on, there's nothing more to see here.]

28 . To this end, the parties pledge to work jointly and in a good faith to foster this political solution and assure its approval by the Sahara populations.

29. Moreover, the Moroccan Constitution shall be amended and the autonomy Statute incorporated in it, in order to guarantees its sustainability and reflect its special place in the country’s national juridical architecture.
[But then, as we saw in § 24, the constitution can still override the statute.]

30. The Kingdom of Morocco shall take all the necessary steps to ensure full integration, into the nation’s fabric, of persons to be repatriated. This will be done in a manner which preserves their dignity and guarantees their security and the protection of their property.

31. To this end, the Kingdom of Morocco shall, in particular, declare a blanket amnesty, precluding any legal proceedings, arrest, detention, imprisonment or intimidation of any kind, based on facts covered by this amnesty.

32. Once the parties have agreed on the proposed autonomy, a Transitional Council, composed of their representatives, shall assist with repatriation, disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of armed elements who are outside the territory, as well as with any other action aimed at securing the approval and implementation of the present Statute, including elections.

33. Just like the international community, the Kingdom of Morocco firmly believes today that the solution to the Sahara dispute can only com from negotiations. Accordingly, the proposal it is submitting to the United Nations constitutes a real opportunity for initiating negotiations with a view to reacting a final solution to this dispute, in keeping with International legality, and on the basis of arrangements which are consistent with the goals and principles enshrined in the United Nations Charter.
[Important. Morocco has realized (or rather, been told to their face, as is evident below) that this cannot be accepted at face value. Their hope is to get UN endorsement of it as a starting point for negotiations, and to entrap the Polisario in talks on how a Moroccan Sahara should be constitutionally configured, rather than on who owns the territory.]

34. In this respect, Morocco pledges to negotiate in good faith and in constructive open spirit to reach a final, mutually acceptable political solution to the dispute plaguing region. To this end, The Kingdom of Morocco is prepared to make a positive contribution to creating an environment of trust which would contribute to the successful outcome of thos initiative.

35. The Kingdom of Morocco hopes the other parties will appreciate the significance and scope of this proposal, realize its merit, and make a positive and constructive contribution to it. The Kingdom of Morocco is of the view that the momentum created by this initiative offers a historic chance to resolve this issue once and for all.

EXPLANATORY MEMORANDUM ON THE APPROCH AND SUBSTANCE OF THE MOROCCAN INITIATIVE
[Here we return to the rah-rah. No more details from this point on.]

The autonomy proposal submitted by the Kingdom of Morocco to the United Nations Organization comes in response to the wish expressed by the international community to break the current stalemate. Meant to foster dialogue and help initiate negotiations, the proposal is limited, at this stage, to the broad lines of the autonomy statute.

1. A proposal largely open to negotiation
• A number of countries wanted Morocco to focus on an open approach and negotiations, instead of a detailed presentation of the autonomy proposal;
[See § 33 and below. This is not only smart image-wise, but also the only way the initiative could ever gain some level of endorsement by the UN. But more importantly, it aims to set up negotiations on autonomy to replace potential negotiations on independence vs. autonomy. The "number of countries" would most probably be the US, because it supports this kind of approach, and France, because it supports Morocco winning and knows how to conduct diplomacy, plus their lesser minions.]
• This is by no means a unilateral decision, nor is it a rigid offer. It is rather an initiative which is open to all the other parties. The aim being to reach a realistic and practical compromise solution;
• Hence, the Moroccan proposal does not go into the details of the autonomy project. At this stage, it is limited to defining the outline and principles governing autonomy, allowing for the proposal to be enriched by the other parties during the negotiations phase.
• What counts most, at this stage, is to set in motion a momentum for peace, by initiating a negotiating process that would permit detailed substantive discussions
[Yes, and see § 33. Given Morocco's record, if it isn't satisfied with the way that negotiating process is going, it could easily drag its heals for another decade just on how to implement autonomy, while Polisario will have abandoned its most basic demand -- effective popular self-determination between independence and integration.]

2. An initiative falling with the framework of the United Nations
• The initiative is in response to calls issued by the United Nations;
[True. The UN's calls for negotiations and concessions from both parties have been thinly veiled encouragements of Morocco's presentation of a less-than-absolute sovereignty. This started with Annan's report in April 2006, where he discreetly and without naming names acknowledged that Morocco's allies ("outside forces" etc) would not permit a forcing of the Baker Plan, despite its unanimous approval by the Security Council.]
• The aim is to break the current impasse, through a proposal which seeks to foster a final, mutually acceptable political solution;
• Morocco is the only country to propose a solution offering extensive regional autonomy, which would enable the populations of the Sahara to manage their own affairs themselves, ensuring at the same time that the Kingdom’s sovereignty, national unity and territorial integrity are preserved.
[True, but so what? They expected another autonomy proposal from Polisario?]
• This Initiative is a compromise solution between two options at the exact opposite of each other, i.e. integration and independence.
[No, it's not. Morocco has been suggesting negotiations on autonomy on and off since the 80s, all the while refusing similar negotiations on independence which could also be construed as a "compromise solution" -- a confederative approach, for example. It is not a compromise between A and B to hold discussions on whether the solution is to be A1 or A2.]

3. A substantial, credible initiative
• The substance of the Moroccan proposal takes into account the social and cultural specificities of the region and is consisted with international autonomy standards;
• The proposal is an integral part of His Majesty’s project to build a modern open democratic society. It derives its strength from the fact that its preparation went through a dynamic process of consultation and democratic participation;
[Oh fuck off. The CORCAS, which supposedly drafted the proposal, was let in on the secret only yesterday. If this is supposed to be the smily face of Moroccan reform, woe unto its people.]
• In addition to preserving the Kingdom’s sovereignty, national unity and territorial integrity, the proposal gives extensive powers to the region endowing it with its own bodies, which will enable the Sahara populations to run their own affairs democratically;
• It gives the region resources of its own, an at the same time makes it possible for it to continue to benefit from the advantages of national solidarity, in order to achieve its social and economic development;.
• The initiative takes into consideration the valuable achievements accomplished by the Region’s populations through their participation in the nation’s institutions as well as in all aspects of economic, social and cultural life;
• The initiative provides for the Region to have its own legislative, executive and judicial bodies, including a high regional court mandated, in particular to rule on electoral disputes;
• The proposal provides for coordination mechanisms between regional and national institutions as well as arbitration bodies to resolve possible disputes over jurisdiction.

4. Concerted implementation
• In keeping with the same principle of negotiation and dialogue, the proposal relies on the parties earnest commitment to contribute, in good faith, to the endorsement of the autonomy Statute, through a referendum by the Region’s populations, who would thus have exercised their right to self determination;
• The Moroccan initiative also provides for confidence-building and transitional measures; amnesty, return of refugees, setting up of a transitional council mandated, among other things, to prepare the first elections in the autonomous Region ;

5. An initiative witch opens up a number of prospects and opportunities
• Putting an end to the sufferings of the Tindouf camp populations;
• Allowing reunification and the return of populations who are now in the camps;
• Giving a fresh chance to boosting the Maghreb construcion ;
• Guarding against the threats and risks of instability in the Sahel and Sahara region.

Autonomy plan leaked?

Via One Hump or Two and Sahara Panorama, a copy of what is purportedly Morocco's final version of the autonomy document has hit the net. No guarantees that this is the real thing, but from the looks of it, it very well could be. But we must stop referring to it as the "autonomy plan", now that we know that the real title is the "Moroccan Initiative for negotiating an autonomy statute for the Sahara Region within the framework of the Kingdom’s sovereignty, national unity and territorial integrity". This makes for another very long abbreviation, in keeping with the conflict's traditions.

Analysis will follow.

[pic: it would look something like this]

Oldest trick in the book

Morocco, finally ready to release its Big Plan, has been trying to hog the headlines all weak with autonomy-related news releases, but then suddenly out of the blue ...

ALGIERS, April 11 (Reuters) - Western Sahara's independence movement Polisario has proposed a "flexible" solution to Africa's oldest territorial dispute that provides for a vote on self-determination and cooperation with Morocco, the group said.

... one plan turns to two. Wonder if they saw that one coming. It's pure publicity surfing, of course, but who knows what may come of it? The Polisario can always count on their one staunch supporter, even if he's dead.

[pic: the conflict that just keeps on giving]

Also, as part of the Makhzen's on-going magical mystery tour of Saharan policy, we note that after countries big and small, as well as politicians and parliamentarians in Morocco, the absolute last group to be briefed by the government on the content of the autonomy proposal before it was presented to the UN, was ... the CORCAS.

No word on whether they are still allowed to claim they wrote it.

-- -- -- --

UPDATE: Both plans are now in. I'd say that worked pretty well for Polisario. Bye, bye, two years of setting the scene for The Generous Proposal:

Morocco, Polisario present clashing W. Sahara plans
Reuters (United Nations)
11 Apr 2007
By Patrick Worsnip

Morocco handed the United Nations Wednesday a plan to resolve a
three-decade-old dispute over the Western Sahara, just a day after the
territory's independence movement submitted its own proposals. (The rest.)

State of the stalemate

[pic: ... and i think you'll find i left you a little present in the decolonization drawer]

I've been slacking off a bit with the updates, but yesterday's monster post on Algeria should make up for that. Also, it's not as if there's been a lot of new movement in the conflict. Morocco has kept promoting its autonomy plan and the MAP is reporting one stunning success after another (even the Comoros islands are now in favour). Meanwhile, the Polisario has kept sending letters to the UN and making statements reminding everyone how incredibly risky all this is for the cease-fire. Morocco must be biting its nails in terror.

What are we all waiting for? Well, April 20, of course. That's when the Security Council is scheduled to discuss the Western Sahara issue. A formal proposal to the Council by Morocco is expected on April 10, but the outlines of it have been run by all or most of its membership already. However, several members have discreetly complained that the briefings they got were sketchy and verbal, and did not give the impression of a finished proposal. If that's true, then the Security Council cannot conceivably pronounce upon it on the 20th. And even if there is a finalized plan, it will probably take some more talking to decide what to do with it.

It's unlikely that it would just be thrown out, since that would cause a stir with Morocco, but it's equally implausible that the Council will allow Morocco's autonomy blurb to kick aside four decades of UN resolutions demanding self-determination.

Words, words, words

What the SC will do, is probably to fight over how encouraging the language in this resolution should be, and then put off any further decisions until later. Great Britain's Sir Emyr Jones Parry is presently acting as Council chairman, and he took a decidedly pro-Moroccan slant in his description of the situation when talking to the press:

In reply to a question about the Western Sahara and United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) mandate renewal, specifically how the Council was going to handle the expected proposal from Morocco on autonomy, he said such a proposal was expected on 10 April. The Council’s response would depend on its contents, taking into account all parties’ views. On the one hand, there was the proposal for autonomy within Morocco; on the other hand, there was the view that self-determination for the region should include the option of independence. He was not confident that the Council would find a lasting solution in the next few months, but he was confident, however, that MINURSO’s mandate would be renewed.

Get that? There's "the view" that self-determination "should include the option of independence", as opposed to the view that it should not. Of course, the whole point of the self-determination process, since 1966, has been to let the people of the territory decide through a referendum whether to become independent or not -- not to allow them to decide what shade of Moroccan they are. Should this novel and strongly partisan language prevail in the final resolution, it could be the beginning of a significant watering-down of the UN's 40-year position on Western Sahara (and on decolonization in general).

But it's also possible that if one step is taken towards the Moroccan position, another could be taken towards the Sahrawi, like, for example, allowing for human rights monitoring under the Minurso mandate. Such forward-backward moves have been made before, to shake up the situation while still giving both parties something to wave their flags at. Letting the Minurso monitor human rights in the territory has been demanded by Polisario for over a decade, and it was recently recommended by a suppressed (but leaked) UN mission report. Accordingly, the suggestion to install a human rights-monitoring mechanism went on the agenda of the last SC meeting, but there it was blocked by a veto-wielding France. Paris recognized that no human rights report would ever show the Moroccan administration of the territory in a good light, and that it would seriously undermine the argument that a Moroccan-run autonomy is in the population's best interest. Other nations evidently didn't feel strongly enough about the issue to press it.

That tired old spin

What are the parties to the conflict saying? Well, the usual stuff.

Moroccan ex-minister Mohamed Ziane is terribly optimistic: "Morocco has a good plan. Algeria will reject it and the whole world community will take notice of Rabat's goodwill to resolve the conflict and will later cut aid to Polisario." (I.e, stop feeding the refugees in Tindouf and so force them to either starve or turn themselves over to Morocco.)

But Sahrawi foreign-minister-in-exile Mohamed Salem Ould Salek is equally optimistic, saying that he's "waiting for a new resolution that is favourable, because the position of Morocco has no legal argument." Now, that's nonsense too, since they clearly have a legal argument (a lousy argument, but an argument), and since it's not so much the argument that matters anyway, as the balance of power in the Council.

Well, who knows which one of them is more correct in his predictions. But come April 21, and believe me: as sure as Western Sahara is one hot and dusty place, they will both declare that they were right on the mark.

...and whither Mauritania?

[pic: the lucky winner]
Since I've already done two posts on the Mauritanian transition to democracy, it would be irresponsible to leave you all without a closing comment, when it is now complete, after closet pro-regime candidate Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdellahi won freely, fairly and narrowly. But I will.

Go check out the Head Heeb instead, and Or Does it Explode (who kindly promoted this blog a while back) where they have a post on the anonymous, but hilariously nicknamed, Mauritanian blogger "X Ould Y". I got much valuable gossip/info (who's to tell) scrolling through his posts when trying to keep up with the elections, although it certainly put my French and Arabic skills to the test...

X Ould Y is another reason Western media should have paid attention to Mauritania's transition. It's not every day you get a fully democratic Arab election -- nevermind three in a row -- and after a decade of chatter on how the Internet will influence democracy, you'd think someone would notice when an amateur blogger changed the fate of a nation. Nah ... but hey, did you hear there was a bombing in Baghdad?

Whither Algeria?

Algeria's rise from the ashes continues, there's no doubt about that. But it remains shrouded in uncertainty on one crucial point: towards exactly what is it rising?

Whatever it is, it must have something to do with President Abdelaziz Bouteflika. There's been some real progress on his watch, from 1999, and as it happens, he doesn't seem ready to step down just yet. While there's not exactly peace, the civil war has definitely been won. The bands of marauding Islamist guerrillas that continue to make parts of Algeria unsecure are no longer a threat to the government or the nation's stability, even if they remain a major irritant, not least to the hundreds that still die every year. The president has decreed reconciliation, which in practical terms mean that while people still fear and loathe each other, they're not officially allowed to anymore, which is some sort of step forward. The bulk of the political-minded Islamists (i.e. not the al-Qaida apocalypse junkies) are about to be reintegrated into the political system -- barring any particularly clumsy attempts to interfere in the parliamentary elections in May this year, which still have a potential to upset the reintegration process. (By the way, do read this fine report, on Islamism in Algeria.) And the economy is looking up, with reform work slogging on slowly but surely, and the climbing oil and gas prices bringing in bucks by the busload regardless.

Bouteflika's regime seems to separate international politics from business far more than any of its predecessors. This is in part because it's aiming at effective liberalization of the economy, and in part because it is chastened by the messy crash landing of the 90s. No Algerian has forgotten how the country's supposed friends and allies stopped returning calls back then, when they were most needed -- something which effectively killed off any lingering desire for international grandstanding and bloc politics.

But that doesn't mean that the country's economic and political comeback won't impact its regional policies. Certainly, an Algeria with internal peace, a more robust economy, and a good relationship to most, if not all, major international players, will become more assertive regionally. So let's have a look at it.


This rentier state aint big enough for the both of us...

Let's first make a few things clear: no nice person has ever led Algeria, pre- or post-independence. And that includes the "Martyr Boudiaf," who, while probably among the least vicious politicians to ever grace Algeria's presidency, still only retains his saintly reputation because he never had time to fuck up. (Remember how he got in power, eh?) This established, and with a look to how things are in Algeria today, I think it's also safe to say no nice person will rule Algeria in the future either, for at least 20 years or so, and probably longer.

So that's a fact, or at least I'm going to treat it as such.

However, that any president will necessarily be a crook doesn't mean it's irrelevant which crook. At present, the scoundrel-in-charge is Abdelaziz Bouteflika -- a power-hungry veteran of Algerian factional intrigue, that is undoubtedly corrupt, has a rather spotty human rights record, and not a single democratic bone in his body. Plus he looks like a choleric little hobbit.

[pic: abdelaziz bouteflika]

But, that said, he has his good sides as well. For one thing, he's a pragmatic realist in what he thinks he can achieve, and how he goes about it. For another, he's got a reasonably good sense of what the economy requires to function and grow -- even if he will mercilessly subordinate economic requirements to his personal agenda, if the need arises. Third, he's eminently pragmatic on how to settle the war: amnesties for all, a good life for sociopathic killers so they stop doing it, and no vain attempts to impose total victory. And fourthly, while not a democrat, he's not exactly an anti-democrat either. He's just a non-democrat: he doesn't give a fuck how he's elected, as long as he's elected. That leaves a little bit of space for oppositional movements to organize in, even if it comes with strings attached and obvious limits. The same goes for freedom of speech -- you're free to dissent as much as you like, even openly, as long as you're not causing him, his allies or his pet projects any serious discomfort. Then you go to jail.

But the most important upside to Bouteflika, may in fact be his sheer efficiency in sucking up power. He has gone from being a military puppet on all too visible strings in 1999, to strapping down most of the military itself in 2004. Methodically, ruthlessly and surprisingly quickly, he has centralized and restructured power to take it away from the competing cliques and fractions of the military state that held it from the downfall of Chadli in 1992 (and arguably, to a lesser extent, before that). He hasn't succeeded entirely -- Toufik Mediène and Smail Lamari are still in place at the DRS and DCE security services, respectively, from where they wield immense power and are certainly in a position to threaten the president himself. But former army head Muhammad Lamari (no relation), presidential "adviser" Larbi Belkheir and powerbroker-at-large Khaled Nezzar have all been forced out of the game, along with many others; the governing apparatus is being restaffed with old Boutef cronies brought back from the political wastelands. Of course, this shift of influence hasn't empowered the Algerian people -- nothing ever does.

What it has done is to increase Bouteflika's own independence from the army, and grant him more power and status within the system. In the process, the political opposition, both leftist/democratic, Berber nationalist and Islamist, has been reduced to a lamentable state of fragmentation and cronyism, and it is certainly not in a position to threaten anyone right now. At best, parties can hope for influence by acting as someone's tool to bash someone else out of power. Thus, Bouteflika is now in charge of the state in a way that none of the other post-coup presidents ever were, and his position is perhaps comparable to that of the late Chadli -- i.e, if he manages to sneak a third mandate, it would take a full-out coup to unseat him. And I think there's a general consensus that Algeria has had enough of those for a while.

So, Bouteflika is now trying to secure that mandate through a referendum, but he already had to postpone it once because of internal opposition -- powerbrokers who are afraid that they're going to be the next ones to go (remember gen. Muhammad Lamari, who suddenly "retired" right after Bouteflika secured a massive shoo-in in the 2004 election, thereby proving who was the boss). That referendum would of course be blatantly illegal and immoral, judged against normal constitutional standards ... but then again, so is the status quo. Bouteflika will have much support from people who aren't otherwise fond of him, simply because they prefer having one dictator with a recognizable face, to seeing that venal crowd of generals getting back in the drivers seat, and starting to fight over the spoils again.


Where all the money comes from and what to do with it

Now, it's already been mentioned that the economy is looking peachy. Or, to be more exact, the economy is still a rotting corpse of post-Socialist, post-civil war mayhem, but it's future is looking peachy. Oil prices are up, gas prices are up, the government is committed to reform, and unemployment and other socioeconomic ills have begun to ebb back since a few years. Money is being spent in a crazy pace, building huge infrastructure projects and salvaging the major cities from the decay they've experienced during the civil war. On top of that, in one bold stroke, Algeria paid off almost all of the foreign debt it had racked up during the botched reforms of the 80s and the civil war, and still managed to hoard billions and billions of dollars in its bulging cash reserves. And sure enough, they bought a whole fleet of Russian fighter jets, setting off an arms race with Morocco, which tried to buy some French fighters to show that they were still in the game -- but of course, being just as poor as they are prestige-conscious, they couldn't pay. In the end, Rabat had to be bailed out by Saudi Arabia, which is always there to help an autocratic monarch in distress. The kingdom was just about to declare victory when, thumbing their nose, Algeria gleefully signed up for a second batch of MiGs.

So, yeah, the Algerian government has more money than it can spend. But one should still remember that Algeria's economic rise is, at this point, still driven almost solely by oil and gas. General economic reforms and liberalizations are moving ahead, but only slowly, and every now and then, even important pieces of legislation are derailed by political manouvering -- such as oil minister Chakib Khelil's darling law on the opening up of the hydrocarbon sector, which was in the end watered down to nothing, after Bouteflika seemingly caved to angry nationalist protest (but who knows what went on in the belly of the beast). The IMF and others complain that the non-hydrocarbon sector of the economy is only now really beginning to grow as quickly as it could, and that much remains to do.

So, the energy sector is now bringing in enormous earnings, and the importance of gas in particular should rise, as Europe is getting ever more panicked over its over-reliance on Russian natural gas for energy. Plenty of contracts are now being struck with southern EU members, and pipelines are shooting up all over the map. Algeria may in fact be overreaching by embracing the Russian proposals for an OPEC-style gas cartel, in that it will lose its possibility to extract favors from the EU as counterweight to Russia (although it will yet have to increase it's portion of the EU imports to do that) and may gain some general western badwill for drawing so close to Russia -- note the connection between hydrocarbon deals and arms sales. Also, some argue that a gas cartel simply wouldn't work the same as OPEC, for technical reasons. But if it does, and the country succeeds in maintaining independence from Russia in such a cartel, Algeria will soon be swimming in political capital.


Algeria's course for the 20th century: Boumédiènism 2.0?

It's all very Boumédiènesque, actually: oil, gas, cartels, Russian arms, economic restructuring and centralizing army rule. The main differences are Bouteflika's considerably more relaxed style of governance, the fact that unlike Boumédiène he doesn't look like Borat and dress like Dracula, and of course the very different content of those economic and political visions.

Where Houari Boumédiène (and, at the time, foreign minister Bouteflika...) was all revolutionary anti-Imperialism and goose-stepping military Socialism, Bouteflika has set his sights on something more similar to an Algerian variant of Gaullism:

[pic: decideurs]

• Externally, it translates into a jealously guarded independence in policy-making, but the commitment to thirdworldism remains (since that is the only field where Algeria has a chance to shine, and even become a top player), even if it is now more realistically engaged, and with no fundamental hangups on the US, France or even Israel. On the contrary, the US is coveted as a potential ally, while France only gets some ritual verbal abuse for being France (and responds in kind), and Algeria has taken a verbally firm but in practice quite moderate stance towards Israel, always careful to toe the Beirut Plan line and firmly supportive of the PLO (the point is to take credit for being a good friend of the Palestinians, while at the same time avoiding rogue state status and missing out on the grand collective peace deal that everyone knows will eventually come).

• Internally, it means a populist-nationalist conception of politics, and a strong state that tries to recreate a sense of identity and pride, to psychologically patch the country together after the traumatic and community-shattering 90s. The economy is to be liberalized, for purely pragmatic reasons (Algeria has decided through trial and error that planned economies suck). But at the same time, the government feels that there's no need to rush it and risk aggravated social unrest, since ample cash is coming in from the hydrocarbon sector to cover for any losses the foot-dragging may cause.

At least that's the plan. If it will work ... well, that depends on what goes on inside the Algerian army, on Algeria's supposed allies, on the oil price, and on Bouteflika's health problems, or lack thereof. And sheer luck ... or lack thereof. But how it all factors into Western Sahara -- well, that's the million dinar question, isn't it?