Western Sahara: Road to Perdition?

Western Sahara: Road to Perdition?

Pablo San Martín argues that by 2004 the UN-brokered ceasefire in Western Sahara, in place since 1991, was close to collapse. He traces the failure of the 1991 Settlement Plan to the dispute over who could vote, which Morocco contested through mass appeals, and then examines James Baker’s Framework Agreement of 2001 and the Baker Plan of 2003, which Polisario accepted and Morocco rejected.

His central evidence is the voter list. Under the 2003 plan the electorate would have been roughly 45 percent native Sahrawis and 55 percent Moroccan settlers. San Martín suggests that Morocco rejected it because it feared that dissatisfied settlers might also vote for independence. He also discusses the change in Spanish policy under its new government and a US position that weakened support for the plan.

He concludes that with Polisario’s options narrowing and pressure growing inside the movement for a return to arms, renewed war was a real risk, one that could destabilise the Maghreb and damage the UN’s credibility.

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