Member of Western Sahara Resource Watch, Elena Pollán, was this week-end forced to leave Western Sahara after harassment from Moroccan police. Pollán was carrying out interviews with Saharawi about the illegal EU fisheries in the territory.
Last week, shipments of phosphates arrived in the ports of Hobart and Geelong in Australia. The vessel above, Livadia, was seen arriving Tasmania 27 May 2011.
Images from El Aaiun, 23 May 2011.
The Moroccan authorities don't accept criticism of their ongoing plunder of Saharawi natural resources light-heartedly. El-Aaiún-resident Ali Saadouni was earlier this month brutally beaten by the Moroccan police for speaking out on the Saharawi’s poor living conditions in a resource-rich homeland.
The import of phosphate rock to New Zealand from occupied Western Sahara carries on. New shipment coming in next week.
Aicha Dahane travels to Australia to denounce Incitec Pivot\'s import of phosphates from occupied Western Sahara.
Last year, WSRW asked Thai firm Precious Shipping to terminate its repeated shipments of phosphate rock from Western Sahara. While still not responding to the request, the firm did another shipment last month.
UK-Irish oil minors will start seismic surveys in occupied Western Sahara in June 2011.
There is no way for the EU member states to know whether the EU fisheries in Western Sahara is according to the wishes of the people of the territory, as international law prescribes.
A report from the Association of the Bar of the City of New York urges the UN to investigate Morocco's plunder of natural resources in Western Sahara.
During the past week, Saharawi victims of severe human rights violations have taken to the streets of El-Aaiún, demanding more respect for their socio-economic rights. Protesters carried slogans calling attention to the ongoing plunder of Saharawi natural resources, perpetrated by Morocco and complicit foreign interests.
President of Western Sahara says the EU is prolonging the conflict through its illegal fisheries in his country's waters.
"Morocco does not have the right to exploit the area’s resources as if they were its own", states Norwegian Minister for Foreign Affairs, underlining that fisheries in Western Sahara "must be exercised in accordance with the wishes and interests of the population involved".
After two days of talks, the European Commission and Rabat have signed a one-year extension of the EU-Moroccan fisheries agreement on Friday 25 February in Rabat. The original agreement, widely criticized for supporting Morocco’s claim over occupied Western Sahara, was set to expire on 27 February.
A Press Release by the Actionsgruppe Westsahara on their demonstration in front of the European Commission's representation in Berlin, Germany, on 18 February 2011.
Denmark could not stop EU’s fisheries agreement with Morocco, which is earning millions on the occupation of Western Sahara. Information (Denmark), 18 Feb 2011.
"In my opinion, we cannot vote for an agreement that is in violation of international law", Swedish minister of agriculture, Eskil Erlandsson, stated in parliament this afternoon regarding tomorrow\'s vote in the Council of Ministers. More states are expected to follow, in trying to stop the continued illegal and unethical EU fisheries agreement in occupied Western Sahara.
Irish Larbour Party parliamentarian, and presidential candidate, Michael Higgins states that the lack of information from the Commisison regarding the EU illegal fisheries is outrageous. "There has been no consultation with the Saharawi people. Prolongation of the current arrangement is a flagrant violation of international law and the founding principles of the European treaties", Higgins state.
Continuing EU fisheries in occupied Western Sahara contributes to prolonging the conflict, states 7 parliamentarians in a letter to the Commissioner for Maritime Affairs. They refer to a resolution from the European Parliament urging Morocco to stop the plunder of the territory it occupied in 1975.
The president of the Western Sahara republic urges UN Secretary General Ban ki-moon for assistance to stop the EU in the plundering of Western Sahara. The EU is considering prolonging the fisheries in the occupied territories in violation of central UN principles and a key UN legal opinion.
The UN states that Saharawi must consent - but the EU doesn't seem to care. Saharawi in occupied Western Sahara protest the EU's violation of international law in their territory, as the European Commission works to continue the unethical fisheries offshore their coast.
Today the European Commission has sent a recommendation to the European Council for renewing the fisheries in Western Sahara for one year. The Commission does not even mention that the fisheries take place in Western Sahara.
Next Friday, the European Commission will formally ask the EU-governments for a mandate to negotiate a 12-month extension of the EU-Moroccan fisheries agreement (FPA) on current terms. Read: one more year of paying Morocco to fish in non-Moroccan waters.
On Monday, the European Parliament's committee for International Trade decided to delay the ratification-process of the EU-Moroccan agricultural agreement due to legal ambiguities.
According to Moroccan police, foreign visitors are not allowed to talk with Saharawi. Several foreign groups have been expelled from Western Sahara or Morocco the last weeks after meeting with local people. This student was kicked out few hours after meeting a network of Saharawi ladies whose sons have disappeared, on 29 January 2011.
The Spanish agrarian organisation COAG is convinced that the impending EU-Moroccan agricultural trade liberalisation agreement could be illegal for implicitly including Western Sahara. COAG has now condemned French company Azura’s presence in the occupied territories.
For the third consecutive day, Saharawi fishermen have been protesting in the harbour of Boujdour, demanding the right to fish in their own waters. Since Monday, Moroccan police officers have been preventing the Saharawi from accessing their boats.
This is how wide you smile when you contribute to the continued illegal occupation of a country.
"We have still time to influence so that the waters offshore Western Sahara are left outside of the agreement", writes columnist Helena Olsson in Finland's largest newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat, on the unethical EU fisheries.
Morocco keeps exploring and marketing its uranium potential in Western Sahara, despite the fact it is in violation of international law.
In December 2010, the long term agreement between the Mexican phosphate importer Innophos and the Moroccan phosphate company OCP expired. The trade has been going on for 18 years, and it is not known whether arrangements have been made to continue the cooperation. The firm has not yet responded to questions WSRW sent in October regarding the unethical purchases from the occupied territory.
The firm Ballance Agri-Nutrients is busy this Christmas plundering the phosphate resources of the Sahrawi people.