Spain warns US that non-UN Western Sahara solution cannot be imposed

Spain's Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez Laya

Credit: Anthony Anex /Keystone

Spain has warned the US that any solution to the longstanding dispute over Western Sahara must be reached through the existing UN peace process, after President Donald Trump announced that his administration backed Morocco’s claim to the territory.

Mr Trump said on Thursday that Morocco had agreed to normalise diplomatic relations with Israel, the fourth Arab state to do so in recent months in a series of deals known as the Abraham Accords.

In return, the US has agreed to support Morocco’s plan of granting Western Sahara, an area it has occupied for more than four decades, a degree of autonomy but refusing a UN-backed referendum on sovereignty.

Spanish Foreign Minister Arancha González Laya said her government welcomed Morocco’s decision to develop diplomatic relations with Israel, but that any solution to the Western Sahara conflict must be negotiated with both sides.

“In both cases [Palestine and Western Sahara], Spain’s position is clear: respect United Nations resolutions in search of a way to resolve these questions," Ms González Laya said during a visit to Israel and the West Bank this week.

Spain was the colonial power in Western Sahara until Morocco invaded in 1975. It has long attempted to strike a nuanced position, seeking close relations with Morocco on key issues such as control of immigration, while promoting a negotiated settlement under the aegis of the UN’s Minurso peacekeeping force in the territory.

Morocco fought a war against the Polisario Front, which wants independence for Western Sahara, until the UN brokered a 1991 ceasefire that has recently been violated in a series of skirmishes between the two sides.

The Polisario Front reacted to the news by condemning "in the strongest terms" Mr Trump’s decision to attribute Western Sahara to Morocco, "something which does not belong" to it.

Shortly after Mr Trump announced his latest Middle East deal, Spain and Morocco said that a summit meeting between their leaders due next week had been cancelled, officially due to the Covid-19 situation.

Western Sahara has recently been a subject of tension within Spain’s coalition government, with Deputy Prime Minister Pablo Iglesias of the hard-Left Podemos party excluded from the team due to visit Morocco after speaking out  in favour of the need for a self-determination referendum in the territory.