After 43 years of failing to legalise its invasion of Western Sahara, Morocco needs to accept a process that would lead to a just, lasting, realistic and mutually acceptable solution to the aspirations of the Saharawi people. 

The coordinator of Saharawi video activist group Equipe Mediawas assaulted, injured and interrogated by Moroccan police in the Moroccan colony of Western Sahara. 

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern spoke of human rights and international cooperation at the United Nations. But what will she do about the fact that two New Zealand companies are the last buyers of phosphate rock from occupied Western Sahara?

The Saharawis of Africa’s last colony Western Sahara don’t have many friends in high places around the world. But if Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour wins the next United Kingdom election it might prove to be a breakthrough in the protracted conflict and prevent a war. 

Morocco has recently been engaged in an unprecedented, frenzied media and diplomatic campaign of misinformation and propaganda in which it has threatened to take military action to forcibly annex the Liberated Territories of the Sahrawi Republic (SADR), alleging that the Frente POLISARIO had violated the terms of the 1991 UN-supervised ceasefire in Western Sahara.

Denmark is fighting for a place on the United Nations Human Rights Council while supporting an European Union fisheries agreement with Morocco that includes Western Sahara, in violation of international law and the ruling of the European Union Court of Justice. 

For more than 40 years, Morocco has forcefully and illegally occupied Western Sahara despite provisions of international law that recognize the country’s sovereignty. The suffering but resolute Saharawi people, especially the younger generation, are getting impatient with endless colonialism. African people and all who value human dignity and freedom must stand up in solidarity with Western Sahara by demanding an end to Moroccan occupation.

February 27 was the national day of Western Sahara, Africa’s last colony that is illegally and forcefully occupied by Morocco with the support of France. In this interview, Malainin Mohamed (Lakhal), a Saharawi journalist and translator and a member of Saharawi Natural Resource Watch, reflects on his people’s struggle for freedom and the role that Africans and other people in the world should play in solidarity.

This latest move by the occupying power Morocco is in violation of the international law principles applicable to mineral resource activities in Western Sahara, which is Non-Self-Governing Territory.

The Saharawi people have for over 40 long years managed to establish a functioning society in the refugee camps in the Algerian desert, near Tindouf. They are ensuring the survival of their people and for the time when independence is won

Morocco appears to a adopt a schizophrenic behavior towards the Saharawi Republic by officially sitting down in international forums side by side with the Saharawi delegation. Yet behind closed doors it continues to wage a campaign to discredit the rights of the Saharawi for full independence

Africa trade unions, led by the Nigerian Labor Congress demanded in solidarity with the Saharawi people that Morocco, a close ally of the United States and France, withdraw its military and security forces from the Western Sahara and hold a referendum on the future of the territory

Setting up a music project in the Saharawi refugee camps in south-west Algeria may not seem to some an obvious priority for a population that relies largely on humanitarian aid for its survival. Yet that is precisely what London-based arts and human rights charity Sandblast has been hard at work doing since early 2010.

Morocco, which militarily controls Western Sahara since its occupation in 1975, is trying to present a false image of the situation in Western Sahara, taking advantage of the military siege and the media blockade imposed on the region.

Music and poetry have been key elements in Saharawi culture since nomadic times, when they were efficient ways of transmitting news and stories, providing entertainment and establishing links among the tribes. After Spain abandoned Western Sahara and Morocco and Mauritania invaded the territory in 1975, music became the voice of the revolution. It played an essential role in the formation and establishment of the new Saharawi Republic and the reshaping of the society. Music, thus, was used by the Saharawis to foster social change.

The Moroccan regime goes into appalling lengths to dehumanize Saharawi school children, even promoting drug use among them to break their resistance. But many of the children are increasingly politically conscious

Africa Contact strongly condemns the harsh and unjust sentences given February 17 by a Moroccan military court to 24 Saharawis - Western Sahara's indigenous population - just for demanding the right to live in their own country without Moroccan occupation and discrimination

Sign a petition demanding their release in the absence of a fair and transparent trial.

A recent survey carried out by Polisario’s youth wing found that over 85 per cent of the young Saharawis polled were in favour of ending the current ceasefire with Morocco and returning to war.

The three human rights organisations are deeply concerned about Moroccan refusal to investigate the assassination of a young Saharawi man, Sai?d Dambar, who was shot dead in the head by a Moroccan policeman on December 21st, 2010.