November 6 will mark the 50th anniversary of the Green March (1975), by which the Kingdom of Morocco invaded Western Sahara. Trump will seek to legitimize it by recognizing Moroccan sovereignty at the next session of the UN Security Council on October 30. The International Socialist League (ISL) supports the struggle of the Saharawi people.
By Chaiaa Ahmed Baba and Ruben Tzanoff
Trump seeks legitimization of the occupation at the U.N.
On December 10, 2020, Donald Trump proclaimed that the U.S. recognized that “the entire territory of Western Sahara… is part of the Kingdom of Morocco”. He stated that the Moroccan proposal for autonomy for the Sahara was the only credible basis for a resolution of the conflict and that an independent Saharawi state “is not a realistic option” for its solution. The U.S. has presented to the UN Security Council a draft resolution which is scheduled to be voted on October 30 and which we reject out of hand.
Geostrategic implications
Trump is acting in the framework of safeguarding the Abraham Accords of “normalization” between Israel and other countries, including Morocco. Zionism pays for the betrayal with military and logistical assistance against the Polisario Front and with the incentive of big business deals. Yankee imperialism seeks to strengthen a key alliance in the Maghreb to put pressure on Algeria, to increase its influence in a strategic zone for the control of the Atlantic and North Africa, the migratory routes, to avail itself of the natural resources possessed by Western Sahara and to better position itself in a continent in which the inter-imperialist dispute with the European powers, China and Russia is also intensifying.
In line with the Mohamed VI plan
Trump’s unilateral proclamation is in tune with Mohamed VI’s plan (2007) to achieve legitimacy and legalize the occupation of the Sahara, which he considers part of his “southern provinces”. This implies burying definitively the self-determination never executed by the hypocrisy of MINURSO, in a territory still pending decolonization, with a people resisting the attacks of the Moroccan army, the “Wall of Shame” and the systematic violation of human rights.
Sanchez’s stab wounds
The Spanish state, through the “progressive” government of Pedro Sanchez, aligned itself with imperialist policy. Historically, as a former colonial power in the Sahara, it maintained a discourse that recognized the pending decolonization of the territory and advocated self-determination. However, it abandoned that stance and consummated it with Sanchez’s visit to Rabat in 2022, officially inaugurating “a new stage” in bilateral relations. Morocco’s monarchical regime plays a key role as a gendarme on the European Union’s southern border in terms of migratory flows, which it uses as a tool for political pressure. Meanwhile, it subjects its people to authoritarianism, extreme poverty and social inequalities, which has led to the outbreak of large youth mobilizations in recent days.
Western Sahara and Palestine: a single twinned cause
Western Sahara and Palestine share the same struggle, twinned by history, resistance and the dignity of their peoples. Both oppressed nationalities face the same colonialist and imperialist enemies who, under the protection of Western powers and the hypocrisy of the UN, have allowed decades of occupation, plunder and denial of the right to self-determination. The Saharawis and Palestinians are struggling to survive, to recover their land, their identity and their national sovereignty. It is no coincidence that in the demonstrations they chant: “Morocco murders, Europe sponsors” and that the same slogan is heard with the rejection of the genocide in Palestine, only changing Morocco for Israel.
Autonomy is not self-determination!
Visibility and solidarity with the Saharawi people are fundamental so that their just cause is not forgotten or silenced by diplomatic maneuvers. That is why they resist, with the Polisario Front, the camps in Tindouf and the mobilizations in exile. From the International Socialist League (ISL) we will continue to support the struggles of the Saharawi people, because autonomy under Moroccan sovereignty is not emancipation, but the legitimization of colonialism. On the 50th anniversary of the Moroccan invasion of Western Sahara, we raise high the banners of self-determination and a Free Sahara! With the conviction that it is necessary to defeat imperialist capitalism and achieve a socialist solution to achieve it in all its dimensions.
You can also read: “Western Sahara in facts”.
