May 27, 2015
The United Nations Security Council’s
renewal of MINURSO’s mandate on April 28 marked a shift in the UN’s approach to
the Western Sahara dispute. The inability of Morocco or the Polisario to
negotiate over Western Sahara’s self-determination—whether autonomy or
independence—has largely confined the UN’s mediator role to contextual, if not
peripheral issues. As a result, the Western Sahara dispute has shifted ground
with Morocco and the Algeria-backed Polisario advancing competing agendas on
the purpose and role of the UN Mission in Western Sahara (MINURSO),
particularly whether the peacekeeping force should monitor human rights. The UN
Security Council’s annual resolution extending the mission Western Sahara,
whose language has remained virtually identical over the last three years, is
no longer subject to negotiation: parties to the conflict are instead focusing
on influencing the reports the UN Secretary General sends to the Security
Council.
Increasingly, the United Nations has a
narrow space to navigate, balancing Morocco’s insistence that MINURSO stick to
its military observation mandate with the pro-independence Polisario’s demands
that the mission focus on monitoring a future self-determination referendum and
reporting on Western Sahara’s welfare and human rights issues. Seeking a
middle-of-the-road solution, the UN has pled for open-source situation analysis
and expanded range of interlocutors. This stops short of a full-blown political
mandate for MINURSO, but the call offers a limited response to fill a dangerous
vacuum and prevent further polarization on the ground. However, the UN’s
attempt to portray its mandate as a provider of independent information about
the Western Sahara territory has pushed Rabat on the defensive, fearing this
could be a back-door revision of the MINURSO mandate.
Although the UN has backed away from
its initial call for a standing, continuous, and impartial monitoring of human
rights (though not explicitly located within the current UN Mission), and has
instead called on parties to strengthen cooperation with existing UN human
rights reporting bodies and mechanisms, Rabat remains concerned. The United
Nations is openly frustrated with Ambassador Christopher Ross’s inability to
interact independently with civil society actors in the territory. Together
with its stated concerns about indigenous Saharans’ perceived exclusion from
the negotiating process, this may have led Morocco to partially suspend
cooperation with the UN, including the mediator’s shuttle diplomacy.
Furthermore, Algeria is now worried about the new direction the UN is taking.
Increasingly, Algeria realizes that a full-blown human rights mandate for
MINURSO will replicate exactly the sort of negotiation format that it has
steadfastly avoided in the Western Sahara conflict. Algeria claims it is not a
party to the conflict, as the dispute is for the Polisario and Morocco to
negotiate. However, any comprehensive human rights monitoring in Western Sahara
and the refugee camps will make Algeria—as a host country to Sahrawi refugee
camps—the direct interlocutor of Morocco, instead of the Polisario, thus
necessitating that Algeria formally come the negotiating table.
In this context, the UN is now content
to limit its stand on human rights monitoring to its repeated call for Morocco
and the Polisario to cooperate with current UN human rights mechanisms and
procedures. This amounts to a face-saving preservation of its facilitator role
so long as there is no clear outlet for Morocco’s and Algeria’s staged
frustration at the lack of progress in searching for a suitable forum to
reframe the dispute. While Morocco may have taken satisfaction in the UN’s
rolled-back role on human rights and MINURSO’s expanded political mandate,
Algiers has taken comfort in the UN Security Council resolution’s persistent language
that “welcomes the parties’ commitment to continue the process of preparation
for a fifth round of negotiations.”
Meanwhile, there is no clear
negotiation forum, no substantive discussion on autonomy and
self-determination, and no genuine appetite for a solution from either party to
the dispute or key diplomatic stakeholders. The status of the territory has
entered a fragile phase that requires bold steps. In the first place, the UN
mediator’s role should be redefined in light of the need for impartial
reporting on the current political developments in the territory and refugee
camps. Secondly, the human rights situation should be assessed through
innovative mechanisms, perhaps by placing a human rights reporting system
outside of the UN’s formal human rights procedures and having a rapporteur
directly answerable to the UN Security Council (which should please Morocco)
and supported by MINURSO (which should please the Polisario and Algeria). This
could offer a compromise solution in the future, as pressure “to do something”
on human rights may increase.
This article is reprinted
with permission from Sada. It can be accessed online at: http://carnegieendowment.org/sada/2015/05/26/new-role-for-un-in-western-sahara/i90f
Jacques
Roussellier teaches international relations at American Military University and
is a co-editor of the book Perspectives on Western
Sahara: Myths, Nationalism and Geopolitics
(Rowman & Littlefield).