The UN avoided commenting on the «red lines» of the Moroccan autonomy plan for the Sahara, emphasized on Monday by Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita. Instead, the UN Secretary-General's deputy spokesman focused on the «origins» of the Sahara partition and referred the matter back to the Security Council. «What I can tell you is that the issue of a possible partition of Western Sahara came up in the course of the regular consultations of the Personal Envoy, Staffan de Mistura, with all concerned in the Security Council. That was last week. This idea, based on an agreement between Morocco and Mauritania in 1975, was raised by then-Algerian President [Abdelaziz] Bouteflika, and presented by Personal Envoy James Baker to the Security Council in 2002. The Personal Envoy [de Mistura] conducted due diligence on this option and concluded that both Morocco and Frente POLISARIO rejected it», stated Farhan Haq. «For this reason, Mr. de Mistura noted in his briefing to the Security Council last week that the remaining options included the documents presented in 2007 respectively by Frente POISARIO and Morocco. He said that he had reminded the parties of the call on them by the Council to expand on their positions. In this spirit, his message to the Council was that the time had come for Morocco to explain and expand on their 2007 autonomy proposa», Haq added. On Monday, October 21, the Moroccan Foreign Minister responded to Staffan de Mistura's invitation. «When the other parties demonstrate a willingness to participate in the process, which is solely based on autonomy, the points that need to be addressed in detail will be examined. However, as long as the other parties have not publicly committed to this process, it remains premature to discuss this appeal», he explained.
