Belgium backs Morocco’s plan to give Western Sahara its own government
Belgium signed a joint Moroccan-Belgian declaration Thursday, becoming the latest Western country to support Morocco’s autonomy plan as a way to resolve the long-running Western Sahara dispute.
Dating back to 1975, the long-frozen conflict puts Morocco, which claims the desert territory as its own, against the Polisario front, which is supported by Algeria and wants to establish an independent state there.
In a joint declaration signed in Brussels by Belgian foreign minister and deputy prime minister Maxime Prevot and Moroccan foreign minister Nasser Bourita, Belgium stated that autonomy under Moroccan sovereignty “is the most adequate, serious, credible and realistic basis to reach a political solution” to the Western Sahara issue.
France, the United Kingdom, and the United States all support Morocco’s autonomy plan at the U.N. Security Council.
A change in EU member state foreign policy on the matter has been indicated by the support for Rabat’s stance from Spain, the previous colonial power in Western Sahara, as well as Germany and Portugal.
Nonetheless, the EU has not backed Morocco’s proposal for autonomy and still backs U.N. attempts to resolve the crisis politically. Western countries who support the autonomy proposal and demand a vote with the option of independence were criticized by Algeria and the Polisario.
According to the U.N., the confrontation is not very intense, and the parties are encouraged to work out a compromise.
