Reuters
by Patrick Markey
Western Sahara’s Polisario independence movement has elected a former ambassador as its new leader after the death of its chief, Mohammed Abdelaziz, who led the front through a war with Morocco and years of diplomatic struggle for self-determination.
Polisario began in the 1970s as a guerrilla front fighting for independence for a territory the Sahrawi people claim as their own since Morocco took over most of the region after the end of Spanish colonial rule.
Abdelaziz died in May aged 68 after more than three decades as leader of the Sahrawi Polisario Front and president of its self-declared Sahrawi Republic, with its base in southern Algeria since a ceasefire in 1991.
Former ambassador to Algeria, Brahim Ghali, was elected by delegates at a congress in refugees camps in the south, where the Polisario has been based since the U.N.-brokered ceasefire following war with Morocco, state news agency APS said.
Ghali, a veteran of the Sahrawi struggle and one of the Polisario’s founding members, comes to the post as his movement is at a crossroads after years of stalemate over a proposed referendum on the disputed territory.
Abdelaziz’s death came at a delicate time after Morocco, angered by a comment by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon during a visit to refugee camps, expelled part of the U.N. peace-keeping mission in the territory earlier this year.
The desert territory, which is rich in phosphate, has been at a diplomatic impasse for more than 20 years since the U.N.-sponsored ceasefire came into force on the understanding a referendum would be held on independence.
The two sides never agreed on the terms of the referendum or who would be eligible for the ballot. Morocco’s king has proposed an autonomy plan instead and invested heavily in the Western Sahara region in an attempt to calm independence claims.
(Reporting by Patrick Markey, editing by Louise Heavens)
