chargement...
The Polisario Front denounced, Wednesday, the decision adopted at the European Parliament after MEPs agreed to extend tariff preferences to products originating from Western Sahara in the framework of the EU-Morocco association agreement.
In a communiqué, made public on its news agency, the Front condemned what it described as an «illegal and shortlisted decision». «The vote taken (Wednesday) was upheld in an environment devoid of scrutiny and transparency», argued the entity.
Moreover, the Front criticized the vote, claiming that it was «a direct blow not only to human rights defenders and international law, but to the very UN-led peace process that the EU says it supports». In the same statement, the Polisario urged «Member States of the European Union to reconsider» the vote and «change course immediately».
Once again, the Front threatened that it would «pursue every legal avenue to reverse the decision». It also indicated that it is launching a legal challenge to the agreement.
Algeria's diplomatic source in Brussels
The Polisario’s reaction was followed by another statement, made public by the Algerian news agency (APS). Quoting an Algerian diplomatic source in Brussels, APS stressed that the European Parliament's vote on the EU-Morocco agreement was an «act of utter treachery».
According to the same source, yesterday’s vote «breaches the ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union».
«This is a terrible day for European institutions and for the international and European law», the same source added. APS did not miss the opportunity to refer to the report submitted by French MEP Patricia Lalonde, indicating that it was a «biased» one.
The same source recalled that Lalonde was forced to resign after an investigation, conducted by online newspaper Euobserver which led to the «subsequent launch of an internal parliament probe into possible conflicts of interest among several other MEPs implicated in the affair».
Before the European Parliament hosted the plenary session in question, representatives of both Morocco and the Polisario declared a war in Brussels.
Indeed, pro-Polisario Sahrawis sent a letter to the European Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs, protesting against the proposal related to the Morocco-EU association agreement.
This letter was made public after Sahrawi political actors in Morocco’s Saharan provinces sent a petition to EU bodies, highlighting the impact of these agreements on these regions' development and how their populations benefit from natural resources.
