Polisario Leader Returns to Algeria after Spain-Morocco Row
The leader of Western Sahara’s independence movement returned to Algeria Wednesday after six weeks of medical treatment in Spain that unleashed a tetchy diplomatic standoff between Rabat and Madrid.
Polisario Front leader Brahim Ghali flew out of Pamplona airport in northern Spain overnight, with a Spanish government source telling AFP on Wednesday morning he was “in Algeria”.
Ghali arrived in Algiers at around 3:00 am (02:00 GMT), where he will continue his recovery from a severe case of Covid-19, top Polisario official Abdelkader Taleb Omar told Algeria’s APS press agency.
He added that Ghali’s improving health meant he not needed hospitalization in Spain.
However Ghali was nonetheless immediately admitted to a hospital in Algiers, where he was visited by President Abdelmadjid Tebboune and military chief of staff Said Chengriha, Algerian public television showed.
Tebboune described the visit as “his duty” and reaffirmed his support for Ghali’s cause, APS reported. The Algerian president also thanked Spain for welcoming Ghali and for the “delicate” care he had received.
Algeria is that the main supporter of the Polisario Front, which has for many years fought Morocco for the independence of Western Sahara , a desert region bigger than Britain which was a Spanish colony until 1975.
Ghali’s imminent departure had been announced late Tuesday by Spain’s foreign ministry — who had informed their Moroccan counterparts — without saying where he was going.
His departure came hours after he was quizzed by a Spanish judge over allegations of torture and genocide, which he denied, during a video hearing from a hospital within the northern town of Logrono.
During the hearing, the judge declined to issue any precautionary measures like seizing Ghali’s passport or holding him in preventative custody, saying there have been no “clear indications of his involvement” within the alleged crimes.
Critically ill, Ghali secretly landed in Spain on April 18 aboard a medicalized Algerian government plane, sparking a diplomatic standoff with Morocco.
The incident triggered a string of terse exchanges which sharpened after up to 10,000 migrants surged into Spain’s North African enclave Ceuta, as guards in neighboring Morocco looked the opposite way.
The Socialist government of Pedro Sanchez accusing Rabat of “blackmail” and “aggression” over the influx.
It was not immediately clear how Ghali’s departure from Spain would affect the strain — although Madrid seemed to be easing its tone on Wednesday, with Sanchez’s deputy Carmen Calvo speaking of “respectful and constructive relations” and “common interests”.
Rabat remained silent, although it too had sought to step back from the crisis on Tuesday, with King Mohammed VI saying Morocco wanted to “settle definitively” things of the unaccompanied minors still in Ceuta.
However, on Monday it had said the crisis between the 2 countries “would not be resolved with (Ghali’s) departure” because it had been linked to Spain’s position on Western Sahara which was “a sacred issue for the Moroccan people”.
Speaking to AFP, a diplomatic source said the Moroccans had been “threatening to interrupt off diplomatic relations with Spain for some days now.
“But the question is whether or not they’re going to go that far, and if not, what options are on the table after the rhetorical outburst of the previous couple of days.”
Isaias Barrenada, an expert on diplomacy at Madrid’s Complutense University, said Ghali’s departure meant Morocco had nothing left to complain about.
Ghali’s presence in Spain “was just a simple pretext… to place pressure on Madrid and its position on the Sahara,” he told AFP.
Morocco’s authorities have long wanted Spain to acknowledge their authority over Western Sahara , as Washington did in December under former president Donald Trump.
But Spain says an answer to the status of the disputed territory can only come from a United Nations-brokered agreement.
Considered a wrongdoer by Morocco, Ghali has headed the Polisario Front since 2016 and is president of the Sahrawi Democratic Arab Republic, a self-declared state in an almost-landlocked area flanking Mauritania’s border.
It covers around a fifth of Western Sahara , while the remainder is travel by Morocco.
Rabat has offered Western Sahara autonomy but insists that the territory, which is rich in phosphates and offshore fishing, is a component of the Moroccan kingdom.
