Western Sahara: Greta Thunberg blasts Morocco’s “crimes”
Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg weighed in on the Western Sahara issue on January 6th, slamming Morocco for “the crimes it commits against the defenseless Sahrawi people.”
According to Al24, a channel affiliated with the Algerian state, the 22-year-old activist visited Tindouf refugee camps in south-western Algeria, close to the Western Sahara border.
Greta Thunberg called on the international community and global media to “to participate in one way or another to achieve justice and hold Morocco accountable for the crimes it commits against the defenseless Sahrawi people.”
The Sahrawi are an ethnic group indigenous to the Sahara who, through the Polisario Front, have waged a armed struggle against Morocco in Western Sahara since the Spanish vacated the region in 1975.
Recently, Morocco’s claims of sovereignty over the territory have gained significant ground, with the US, France, Spain and Israel all officially approving the country’s annexation of the area.
In a statement to the Algerian media, on the sidelines of the International Conference in Solidarity with the Sahrawi People, Greta Thunberg expressed her “deep regret for the silence prevailing among many countries regarding the Sahrawi issue, as well as the Palestinian issue and the genocide faced by the Palestinian people.”
She said: “We all must stand by the Sahrawi people in light of the global climate crisis that negatively affects current and future generations, a situation for which the Sahrawis are not to blame.”
While many in Algeria welcomed Greta Thunberg’s comments, Moroccan World News, a government owned media outlet in Morocco, condemned the young activist as “clueless” and “self righteous”, and accused Algeria of influencing her stance.
Moroccan Word News said: “Where countless UN reports and independent assessments by EU bodies and humanitarian NGOs have accused the Polisario leadership and Algeria for the distressing conditions in the camps, the 22-year-activist pointed the finger to Morocco instead.”
Indeed, according to Middle East Eye, Algeria lost the moral high ground in the Western Sahara dispute in 2015, after the European Anti-Fraud Office’s (OLAF), an arm of the EU, reported that Algerian and Polisario authorities had embezzled humanitarian aid destined for the Sahrawi refugees for decades.
Moroccan Word News rightly claimed that Algeria and the Polisario Front have refused to allow the UN to conduct a census in the camps because, as confirmed by MiddleEastEye, this would end the lucrative scheme.
Al24, Algeria, Middle East Eye
