Talk:Polisario Front

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[edit] This article isn't written neutral!

Al the text you 'd read here in the article is all written pro-polisario. Some people who change things without resources must stop doing that, it is unsence! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.71.93.115 (talk) 18:05, 13 November 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Why do you keep changing what I put

200,000 POWS suffered for 28 years. It doesn't matter what their country did. The Polisario Front had no right to keep them prisoner for 28 years. If you continue to change it. I will simply put it back. Stick your crappola in your asses. This article is biased. You can't act like they didn't exist.

==Needs to clarify if it is the sort of anti-democratic "democratic republic" typical of== Marxist-Leninist revolutionaries.

Also, if it has "prisoners of war", to what treaties is it signatory? Does it follow the Geneva Convention, for example?

I'm thinking of renaming Polisario to Polisario movement or even merging it with the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic article.

Does the article list the grievances the movement has with Morocco, and the aims of the SADR? Uncle Ed 14:49, August 19, 2005 (UTC)

a) As far as I can see, they are not a Marxist-Leninist group, although not surprisingly, some Marxists internationally have taken up their cause (as with other such groups, such as the Palestinians).
b) I'm not sure if they are a signatory to the Geneva Convention (I suspect not, considering their limited international recognition), but the question is somewhat moot if they are releasing all their prisoners.
c) Why on earth would you do that? You're already in enough trouble for trying to dictate your own policy, and policy currently states that we use the most common name for things and that we do not participate in original research (i.e. pulling new names for things out of thin air). In this case, it is the Polisario Front - note that this has twenty-five times the Google hits of Polisario movement (I have no idea where you pulled that name from). And merging this with Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic makes no sense at all - it would be like merging Fretilin with East Timor. sAmbi 16:42, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Cleanup suggestions

If anyone who understands this topic is looking for cleanup suggestions, I'll start a list...

  • Article needs an intro section, rather than consisting only of a chronolocial list of events. --P3d0 16:44, August 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • It needs more coverage of the recent events, especially the recent freeing of prisoners. --P3d0 16:44, August 19, 2005 (UTC)


===>Answers

Polisario used to be a socialist organization, but is now free market.

This is american misunderstanding of socialism. In Spain, to pick one, the Socialist party is the majority and we are a free market economy and we love it. Socialism has become a by-word for welfare state, not communism as many americans with whom I have had the pleasure to argue think. In particular if you think socialism is not free market then I think american liberalism is fascism. Please, brush up on your politics and stop thinking of socialism and evil when it is the prevalent state of affairs in Europe and its Welfare State.Cgonzalezdelhoyo 22:54, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

The SADR, as of this morning, no longer has POW's, they were all released to the Red Cross.

You should not merge SADR and Polisario, as the former is a government (like the U.S. federal government) and the latter is a political party (like the Republicans).

The SADR has several grievances with Morocco, the foremost being occupation. It wants completely sovereignty for the Sahrawis.

      • > Polisario is not a free market because there are no goods to trade. It has been supported by communist Algeria (back in the days) as a che guevarist guerilla to create a new state in the area. Polisario still has a main supporter in the person of Fidel Castro and still abducts many children from their families in the camps at a younger age and send them for communist indoctrinment and brainwashing (look in google for this testimony : "Ma Oulainie").

===>Several comments: The equation of "Polisario" with the "refugee camps in Tindouf" is troubling, and belies your political biases. There are no abductions. Ma Oulainie is a woman who is paid by the Moroccan government to travel the world, living in nice hotels and eating fine cuisine spreading lies and propaganda against the Polisario and Sahrawi people. I personally know someone from the camps, and he says that going to school out of the camps was a rare privelege, and that ministers from the SADR personally came twice a year to deliver mail to the children. Ma Oulainie is a liar and is a tool of the Moroccan government.

on polisario and marxism/leninism: no, they always, from the very beginning, explicitly stated they were NOT marxist (and thus of course not leninist either). they called themselves socialist for some years, but never put any ideological effort into it. for a long time now they've been advocating some kind of general multi-party-free market-thing after liberation, but won't go into specifics. the reason they are consciously trying to stay clear of ideology is a) that's for the politicians of a free WS to decide, b) they do not want to exclude any part of sahrawi society, when forced to represent it as a whole during the war phase (just as WW2 resistance movements were seldom openly ideological). the pre-invasion years were of course different, when they existed in a semi-normal opposition role (albeit banned), and this lead to the early ideological commitment to socialism.

as for the POW:s, i don't see why the issue should be mentioned here at all. is there ANY other war-related wikipedia article w[h]ere FORMER prisoners of war are mentioned...? i'll delete this.

      • > I beg to disagree, the Polisario proclamation clearly states that : "The SADR defines itself as socialist." Also, during all the war years, they did commit to the USSR who provided them in exchange through Algeria with Soviet weaponry. Their ongoing strong relationship with the Castro regime is surely incompatible with the market system they vow to establish.

===>And Morocco received French support The French, who are socialists themselves, gave military and financial support to Morocco in their invasion - does that make them socialists, too?

==>POW's are relevant They were the longest-held POW's in the world, and they were recently released. That is worth inclusion. Justin (koavf) 04:44, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

===> well, if you want it back, i won't fight it. i just think there must have been very many POW:s held for a longer time than that in the not-so-distant past (mandela sat for 27 years after being caught in armed rebellion, and some hezbullah people sat in jail for 26 years before being swapped in 2004. i actually think some of them are still held). so while i definitely saw a reason for including it while they were still prisoners -- they were then the presently longest-held -- i honestly can't see one now. now they are only "the former POW:s held for a long time, but not the longest". is that terribly important?

also, slightly disturbingly, no mention at all is made of the 151 sahrawi POW:s morocco is supposed to hold (for the same amount of time, due to the same cease fire), that is, if they haven't all been killed after capture. in addition to that, hundreds of civilian anti-occupation activists are still unaccounted for, after having been abducted from 1975 onwards. (that's 10 years before the first POW now released was captured, right?). so if time behind bars is what counts, the moroccan soldiers are way behind.

about geneva conventions above, the SADR is no universally recognized state and so haven't been able to sign them, but the polisario has declared it will follow all relevant humanitarian rules and the laws of war. however, as already stated, they no longer hold any POW:s.

ARRE

    • > The geneva convention actually applies to Algeria as the host state, not the polisario per se, may be on a civil algerian court, the polisario torturers can be tried but on an international law level, the algerian part is responsible of all what happened to these prisonners. Please read the Amnesty international reports.

===>The Sahrawis are statless persons They are not citizens of any state, and are refugees in Algeria - I don't know that they are subject to their law.

===>You're right about the "Disappeared" There should be treatment of the arbitrary arrests and kidnappings done by the Moroccan authorities, but they wshould be minimal, as this article is about the Polisario. So, if the Polisario and the Moroccans did the exact same thing to one another, text describing what Polisario did is more important than text describing what was done to them. Are you by chance a Sahrawi? I do think that discussion of the Polisario's policy on POW's needs to be discussed, including their historic release. Justin (koavf) 15:59, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

===>No, I'm neither Sahrawi nor Arab. Ok, so leave something in on the POW:s, but I don't think it's fair to say the two parties "did the exact same thing":

- Polisario captured soldiers and held them as POW:s; they are now all released. - Morocco also captured soldiers but probably killed most of them rightaway. It still refuses to provide information on what happened, and 151 POW:s are unaccounted for. (The rest are declared dead.) - Morocco additionally abducted 1,500-2,000 Sahrawi civilians, mostly independence activists and their relatives. Most were released after many years, or declared dead in prison, but since the latest release in the early nineties, about 500 are still missing. Maybe they're all dead, maybe not. The point of "disappearance" is never to let the family know. The regime did the same thing on a smaller scale to its own dissident population in the Tazmamart concentration camps etc; this has been scrutinized by Moroccan human rights org's, but the Sahrawi question remains untouchable.

      • > that is absolutely not true, glad you used "probably" because there is no proof that Morocco killed all the prisonners, on the contrary, the red cross had supervised all the releases of Algerian and polisario POW's at the end od the fighting and was satisified that they have been liberated on time without all the torturing and that the Polisario practiced for years after the end of the war on these people.

===>No evidence of torture It's true that the Moroccan POW's were in deteroirating health, but there are barely enough material resources to let the peaceful Sahrawi refugees survive. Plus, Morocco has murdered and abducted hundreds of innocent civilians, denied it, released some of these people that they claimed didn't exist in 1998, and denied that there were more. The Sahrawi POW's were always available for inspection by foreign aid workers, but Morocco won't let anyone inspect their POW's, because they lie and say they don't exist.

My point: This is in no way "the same thing". I find it unbalanced to bring up as a human rights issue only the lawful capture of POW:s while ignoring the other side's random abductions of civilians and routine killings of captured tropos. Also, it is historically a central pillar in Moroccan government propaganda, to try to cover up its own human rights abuses by pointing to the Polisario "doing the same thing" by holding POW:s. Thus the very mention/non-mention of these things is political from the start, and should be balanced as far as possible. Now, I certainly don't mean to accuse you of this, but I definitely think it would please some of the people who have started to sabotage these articles for not conforming to Rabat doctrine.

A second point, of less importance, is that the piece that was in there on the POW:s was confusing, and a patch-work of old and new stuff. That should be fixed too.

ARRE.

      • > I also disagree here, there is nothing confusing about the Geneva convention. It is clearly stated that at the end of the fighting, all prisonners should be released without any condition from both sides. Morocco did its part, Polisario just did. That doesn't discount the prisonners to sue the Polisario or Algeria for clearly vilating the other Geneva convention articles related to tortures, killings, etc..

===>Entirely false Morocco did not do their part. In addition to the Sahrawi civilians and combatants caputred, imprisoned, and extrajudiciously killed, Morocco turned away the Moroccan POW's that were released by the Polisario. These people were called cowards and traitors for not killing the enemy after surrender, and were not allowed to re-enter the country. If you provide some evidence of Polisario torture, this would be a different story, but now you're just asserting it as though it's a proven fact.

===>I completely agree Certainly, the human rights grievances are far worse on the Moroccan side, and they are deeply implicated in much more human suffering. I was simply saying, hypotheticall, if both sides had done essentially the same thing, the Polisario actions merit further explanation, as this is the article on the Polisario. The article does need a re-write. It's one of a number of things to do on my list. If you can re-write it to make it more intelligible and factual, please do. It's good to meet a fellow supporter of the SADR. Justin (koavf) 15:30, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

===>Of course they were worse off Morocco is a modern sovereign state that is self-sufficient, whereas the Sahrawis live in refugee camps off of foreign aid. Of course the Moroccan POW's aren't the first priority when it comes to distributing food and medical aid, but that's an entirely different matter than deliberate torture. Justin (koavf) 02:07, 5 October 2005 (UTC)



===> I'll gather all my responses here. I have three main things to comment on.


1a) Is Polisario communist or socialist and anti-free market? No. They ALWAYS stated EXPLICITLY that they were not communist or marxist, because communism and marxism was not "applicable" to their situation, whatever that meant.

Initially they called themselves socialist (in the first SADR constitution this was written), but when asked to specify what that meant they talked about something like a welfare-state (free hospital care and housing, but also private property and investments from multinationals).

Later they dropped even that, and in essence I think they were just caught up with the seventies liberation movement rhetoric. In the latest version of the constitution (from the mid-nineties I think) they state EXPLICITLY that they want a free-market, multi-party system.

b) But they received support from communist Algeria? Yes, but no. Algeria was never ever communist. It was socialist for quite a while (it might still be, I'm not sure), but the FLN jailed the communists and broke up their party, rather than let itself be ruled by them. This proves nothing about the Polisario, though. The Palestinians had the same support from Algeria, and not only the socialist factions, but significantly more the non-ideological main factions like Fatah and the PLO in general.

c) ...and the USSR! No, they did not. The USSR refused to recognize the SADR and negotiated fishing agreements in Sahrawi waters with Morocco. Check the country recognition lists yourself and see if you can find a single Warsaw Pact country on them. Neither did they receive backing by China.

d) ...and they help Castro kidnap kids! This is ridiculous beyond belief. Sahrawi kids are given the opportunity to study at universities in Cuba, which is a chance they jump at, given that there's no higher education facilities in the camps. I've met several Sahrawis who studied there. None of them was communist, and none felt kidnapped. Similarly, many children go to Algeria and Spain to study, and some to Italy and France (yes, France!). Are they also kidnapped? And though I'm an avid Castro-hater, please explain to me exactly WHY Cuba would forcibly kidnap people from the Western Sahara, educate them and then send them back there?

e) Polisario is not free-market because they have no goods to trade! This doesn't prevent them from wanting a free-market Western Sahara; poor people can still read books on economics. Or just pursue their thousand-year-old merchant traditions. And, actually, there is private trading going on in the camps, with what little money and goods people have: I bought a nice t-shirt.


2. The POWs were badly treated Probably yes, in the beginning. Since the Red Cross started its visits in the eighties, no. However, the most common complaints of later days (bad food, tough heat, only tents for sleeping etc) is what you get when living in a Sahrawi refugee camp, prisoner of war or not.

The main point though, is that there are no POWs there any more, and to mention their FORMER existence in the refugee camps just because that was once a major part of Moroccan propaganda, is a bit odd already, in my book. To go on and write a whole piece on how "these camps were also the place where some Moroccan POW:s were possibly ill-treated in the early 1980s" is so off-topic its POV.


3. You. I'm sure there's things that could be improved in the articles, but you're acting hysterical. You're repeating the most bizarre and unlikely war-time propaganda from the Moroccan government (even they've dropped some of it, YOU should be able to do better...). Don't expect that to get into ANY article, any more than the North Korea article will proclaim it to be a Workers' Paradise Under Threat From Evil American Fascist War Mongers.

Since you're obviously most interested in promoting the Moroccan view, I'm sure there's loads of stuff for you to do. You could dig up all the Polisario documents so we can find out exactly how long they were socialist for (check arso.org and wsahara.net, most of the constitutions and stuff you can read there), or you could provide some information on the counter-Polisario movements the Moroccans have set up, or on positive Moroccan reform or whatever. But claiming that the Polisario is really Fidel Castro running a child-trafficking network through the Sahara won't do you OR Morocco any good. And it certainly doesn't help the article.


ARRE

[edit] Why is there no mention of the 300.000+ Saharawis refugees in Algeria?

And is the Polisario still seeking independence? It maybe its initial purpose, bur for many years it has agreed to settle for a referendum under UN supervision, a suggestion to which Morocco oposes by wanting only those in the occupied areas to vote, many of them Moroccan immigrants, and not the 300k+ refugees in Algeria... Furthermore, as of late Polisario is not a violent organisation and serves as a government for its people in exhile, organising public services such as medical cover and enducation.

Unfortunately Morocco, whith its military might, will continue to subdue Western Sahara for many decades to come, but so did the French in Algeria for 130years and eventually had to leave. Morocco has a time bomb in its hands unless it can get saharawis to feel Moroccan, and we in Spain know that is going to be impossible, because after nearly a millenium, there is still independence sentiment in regions like Vasque Country, Catalonia, Balearic Island, Valencia...

Furthermore, I have a Moroccan flatmate who is studying in a Spanish university, he is from Nador in north Morocco and he has told me that there are Bereber people who would be willing to kill and fight for independence of the north. At the moment, under an absolutist monarch, like those we had in Europe about 2 centuries ago, the country is held by a firm grip, but I cannot but feel that if Morocco continues to develop its economy, helped by the EU, its society will start to demand more democratic means of government and indivual rights, and many problems like the Bereber or the Saharawis will be more difficult to handle.

Cgonzalezdelhoyo 22:56, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Totally disputed

The article is definitively not neutral, please make some revisions to comply with WP principles of neutrality. Best regards. Daryou 08:59, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

Reply

I don't see the problems with it. But I think we did a good job on the Sahrawi article, so let's work the same way here. One change of method, though: we had ridiculously long threads on that talk page, so let's do this piece by piece instead - it'll be easier for both of us, and everybody else, to see keep track of what we are doing.

So, I suggest, you just start by writing one or two things that you are unhappy with here in the talk page, and we'll discuss them and quickly agree to something; then move on to the next complaint, if you have any. Does that sound okay to you? Arre 19:03, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

Ok, I'll remove this now. Arre 03:14, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] External Links

To Justin,

  • Please refrain from rating links. Treating reports as controversial when they don't suit your own opinion is as such controversial. I don't tell how controversial I find all the links you use.
  • In order to quote in a "scientific" maner I use now the original names of the links and/or the titles of the reports/texts/contents. This is the most accurate and obligatory way to quote sources.
  • In order to separate (for visitors) the links on the basis of their view I wrote this in brackets, outside the link area. The link area shoudl contain the exact title of the site and the exact link. wikima 19:59, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Foreign relations and Spain

I am surprised that nothing is mentioned about Spain, we, specially in Andalucia and other socialist majority regions (this is free-market socialims) feel we have a debt to Sahara as we let it down by allowing Morocco to take over. I believe there were agreements with Morocco that the Sahara would have a right to self determination, which ofcourse were ignored.

This comitment to the Saharawi people involve many aspects: - My neighbour for one, hosts saharawi children who come in the summer to spend time away from the camps. They spoil them completely and treat them as one of their own. This is part of an yearly program to give the children a glimpse of life out side the camps, I am not sure how many came last year to Spain alone, but we are defenitely talkin in the thousands. - The spanish government and in particular the Andalusian Regional government is comitted to the saharawi situation, regularly receiving politician to talk in parliament and to its members. As a recent example, there have been repeated attempts by members of the Andalusian parliament to visit occupied sahara as observers, being rejected by Moroccan authorities repeatedly. - There is a general awarenes and sense of guilt, as I say, about the saharawis, I have attended several talks about the camps in Tinduf and the political situation of the conflict. These involved showing short films and documentaries as well as having saharawies come and talk to us. Needless to say that there is close coverage in the news about the conflict.

Please bear in mind that Moroccan King Hassan II, organized the Green march at a time when Spain was at its weakest, Franco, the military dictator, was dying and the Transition which led to democratic constitution being drawn and elections called (a period of about 6 years), was just embrionic and in the shadows waiting for Franco to die. With this situation in Spain we were in no position to make a stand in the Sahara. In that sense there is a general feeling that we have to return the blow to Morocco, as was shown a couple of years ago, when Moroccan officials occupied a lonely rock outcrop of the coast, nominally under Spanish soverignty, and Aznar, the then rightwing consevative prime minister ordered the army to go in with its special corps to kick them out. It was all simbolic, there was no aggresion from Morocco, but neither was there aggresion during the Green March in 1975 and we were forced by the circumstances to flee and abandon the saharawi people to Moroccan and Mauritanian domination.

Now that we finally again have a democracy there is an overwhelming feeling of guilt towards the Saharawi people. It is true that we were a colonial power but we also have a great simpathy towards them and we would have liked to see their right to self determination being upholded. I will try to get references and include as much information on this as possible.

I would also like to see something include to the effect that Moroccos beligerant foreign policy with its neighbours, Algeria and Western Sahara, was a means to bring national unity under an absolutist Monarch like Hassan II, who suffered three assesination attempts by his own military forces. The use of wars under dictators is recurrent in human history as a means to divert attention from internal problems and conflicts. In that sense the saharawis have fallen victims to a larger more powerfull neighbour, which is also a recurrent event in human history.

Unfortunately history shows that if a power can hold a territory it becomes its own, until it can no longer do so. I expect that if Morocco manages to develop with the help of the EU and obtain democratic rights and government, the issue with the saharawis will become more difficult to handle without the strong rule of force and eventually either they will get regional or full independence. Unfortunatelly, in the mean time, the saharawis will be the victims and the Moroccans will have to continue to pay the expensive bill of military occupation. The only one that is the real winner in this situation, is their absolutist monarchy.Cgonzalezdelhoyo 00:01, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article dispute

I'm not trying to get into any sort of article dispute here. I simply was reverting an edit that I recognized as clearly NPOV. I have no opinions regarding this article. In fact, I don't even fully understand the issue. I was only here reverting something NPOV, and am not trying to participate in any argument. Mo0[talk] 01:33, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

I am not currently accusing you of anything, I saw your name for a revert and wanted this to end so I asked you to come here. False Prophet 01:41, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

If anyone objects to the current version please say so. False Prophet 01:43, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

I added "POV" and "disputed" tags. The chapter named "invasion", is complete POV. It is written from the point of view of one party of the conflict (Polisario).

  • "Thus, immediately upon Spain's withdrawal in 1975, Moroccan and Mauritanian troops invaded and occupied the Western Sahara and expelled most of its native population". This is both POV and untrue. The point of view of Morocco is that it got back its southern provinces back, as it did with Tarfaya-Tantan, and Ifni a few years earlier. From the Polisario front's view, it was occupation. So neutral sentence would be "As a consequence of the Madrid Accords, Spain handed over Saguia Hamra to Morocco, and Rio De Oro to Mauritania.".
  • "Expelled most of its native population". The population was displaced by the polisario and the Algerian Army (Amgala). So to say that Morocco displaced them is false, and needs either to be proven or removed.
  • The rest of the chapter will have to be looked at closely, if that is at the level of encyclopedic information.
  • I think the article is missing a very crucial point: The mention that many Polisario front leaders have returned to Morocco( Former ministers of Foreign affairs, defence, justice, internal security, ..., and recently the "Philosopher" of the Polisario).
  • You would think the article is written by a Polisario front member. The article should be according to WP guidelines, neutral, informative, and accurate, and mentionning the pros and cons of the the Polisario front, instead of being full of praise and admiration to the Polisario and SADR, and being critical to the other part of the conflict. --SteveLo 07:54, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I am not sure how this comment seccion works, but there is nothing POV about calling the Moroccan military march into Western Sahara for an invasion.

  • There was an invasion and there is an occupation. That is the position of the UN, based on international law, and not only the position of the Polisario movement.
  • Regarding the question of why the population left, it is clear that they fled the Morrocan invasion. When foreign military enters a country/territory it is widely common that large parts of the original population flee. This happend with Western Sahara in 1975-76 as well. Having fled to areas further inside the desert towards the Algerian border, refugees were bombed by Moroccan airforce. They then moved onwards to Algeria. Now, someone may argue that the population was not expelled, but since it was attacked by military I see no real conflict in this term.
  • About Polisario leaders leaving for Morocco - writing "returned to Morroco" implies that Western Sahara is Moroccan, which off course was not the intention. ;-) - SteveLo has a point. That might well be added to the text, since it was an important move which lead to reforms in the camps and more openess within Polisario. Anyone interested in this should read Tony Hodges' book on Western Sahara, and Toby Shelley's more recent one.
  • Regarding peoples position in this issue; Since Morocco has very, very weak legal ground for its claims on Western Sahara, anyone who writes about the conflict from a legal point of view, will most likely sound pro-Polisario. At least for someone who is not. --

/Lorenzo 14:33, 11 July 2006 (GMT)

Lorenzo, as I stated above, there are two point of views. You call it an invasion, another one does not. For Moroccans, it was completing the return of the Southern Saharan Provinces (Saguia Hamra(1975), and Rio De Oro(1979)) after they had liberated the Northern Saharan Provinces (Tarfaya (1958), Tantan(1958), and Ifni(1969)) which both formed what was Spanish Sahara.
  • The UN considers the territory disputed, and not occupied. If it were occupied, then there would not be as one of the solutions integration with Morocco or becoming integral part of Morocco; the UN would have approved occupation, wouldn't they?.
  • None of the UN documents (Assembly general, Secretary General reports, Security Council resolutions ), none contains the word "occupied".
  • Only a part (minority) moved to Algeria, and again the Algerian Army was directly involved in displacing the sahrawis (Amgala). They don't deny it, but they called it "humanitarian assistance to get the Sahrawis safely to Tindouf".
  • If the Moroccans were bombing the civilians, I guess there would not be a single Saharawi in what is now controlled by Morocco (80% of the territory). How could the Moroccan airforce, alone in the skies, bomb, and bomb, and bomb, where are then the thousands of casualities??. The number of "refugees", which the UNHCR has never been allowed to count, is given as more than 200 000. There is a lot of discrepancies out there.
  • Well if Hadrami, or Brahim Hakim, or Ayoub, or Yehdih, or BentAbbi, or ...., if they say they returned to their country, it would be amusing hearing someone telling them: "No you did not return, but you left for your country". Abdelaziz was born in Morocco and his father has lived all is life in it, if Abdelaziz "moves" to Morocco, would you call it "returned" or "left for" Morocco? ;-)
  • Opennes within Polisario!!. Well the return to Morocco started mainly in 1988, that makes it 18 years of reforming and "openning". By now (after 18 years of "glasnost" ;-) the Polisario should be very ahead of, at least, Eastern Europe who waited till the fall of the USSR in 1991 to start the demcratisation. I would not imagine a person with his right mind putting a dime on it. I invite you to look at the list of RASD government from 1988 till now, apart from the members that returned to Morocco, the rest just inter-change positions, except for his excellency the president of the republic of course. Is that openness?
  • Tony Hodges was openly pro-Polisario. His writings are then not considered neutral.
  • I did not understand what you meant with "very, very weak legal ground". Legally, if Saguia Hamra and Rio De Oro are not Moroccan, then Tarfaya, Tantan, and Ifni should not be. By the way, most of the Polisario leaders, (and Polisario supporters inside Morocco itself) are from "pre-1975" Morocco ( Assa, Tarfaya, Guelmim, and even Marrakech). Cheers. --SteveLo 21:51, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Algeria & defectors sections

The Algeria section was basically a good add, even if based on a spurious source (ESISC) and somewhat slanted in its language. I made language fixes to this. The defectors section added at the same time was, however, grossly oversized and again used ESISC as its only source, also in a serious POV manner quoting its statements as fact, not as the organization´s claims. The long list of "important" defectors contained a number of names that even I, who have a near-obsessive interest in this issue and regularly reads the press of both sides, have never heard of. I picked out the top four/five names (Hadrami et al) and reduced the POV slant to this. Both sections needs (a) more sources and (b) counter-sourcing/counter-arguments, but this is fine for now. Thanks to Wikima for the effort.


Arre, you're welcome...

Algeria and Polisario:

  • Your changes are, as usual, an attempt to inject polisarian POV.
  • Algeria is not only a main player in the conflict but was and is fighting Morocco at all levels since the phase before the beginning of conflict. In the reports of the UN it is quoted much more often than Polisario itself. Their diplomats and high execusitfs spend their time writing letters to the UN and elswhere and promoting the recognition of the so called "sadr"
  • without this Polisario would be nothing, just nothing.
  • What your changes try to hide is that, every time when the topic is dealth at the UN for example, it is Algeria who is active at least as much as Morocco, while Polisario is quite and listens.
  • I don't accept your deletes as the section clearly states that Polisario has no room of Manoeuvre vis-à-vis Algeria. If you observe "obsessively" the issue sonce long time and ignore this then...
  • I'lle revert to my version your changes meet the core.

Defections:

  • The organisation becomes "controversial" because it is against your opinion.
  • The source you deliver is a fake. It is Jamai who says that ESISC is a fake organisation not RSF. Jamai, himself a largely controversed journalist in Morocco. His issue on the ESISC was just bad, very bad, incompetent and full of hatred style and affection. And we can discuss this separtely at length if you like.
  • I quote ESISC because it is the organisation that presents such a list, but it should be no problem to add other sources as the Moroccan press is full of them. I'll see.
  • Finally the title is not about defections from the movement but about defection of the top leaders, two different things. I think Polisario is the only orgnaisation in the world that suffered such bleeding.
  • The importance of these defections is not to show how many they are (though) they are important, but because they put a light on the convictions within the organisation. A light that you always know how to hie with your elegant editings.

I'll revert. Cheers wikima 23:12, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Arre In addition to Wikima's remarks I add the following:
  • ESISC is not a fake NGO, but a real Center. BTW, in the same article Polisario is termed as separatist.
  • You wrote "... but [Algeria] refuses to assume a formal role in respect to the sovereignty dispute, stating that it will not and cannot negotiate on behalf of Polisario". That is not true. When Baker proposed his plan number 1 in 2001, the refusal came from Algeria before Polisario, in the famous letter from Boutef to Annan, which Annan made public to Boutef's surprise and anger. And is it enough a proof to remind you that Algeria proposed that the Sahara be divided, a proposition till this day the Polisario never dared to comment/condemn/support?
  • the list is that of Top leaders not simply defectors. Since 1989 more than 10,000 sahrawis have returned to Morocco. The list is therfore a major edit and all the persons mentionned in it are prominent figures in Morocco and is verifiable.--A Jalil 23:54, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Modifications explained

[edit] The beginnings

  • There is no link between the Polisario and previous Sahrawi political activity. The Polisario founding members were Moroccan students, sons of Moroccan Southern Liberation Army veterans. The only founding Polisario member to have had a contact with Bassiri is Lehbib Ayoub, who is now in defence of Moroccan territorial integrity. The preambule of the SADR constitution says "The Sahrawi people - arab, african and Moslem - who decided to start its struggle of liberation in 1973, under the the guidance of the POLISARIO Front, to free the country from colonialism ...". So the Poilsario takes on itself the credit to have started the struggle, and if someone alledges the opposite, there should be reliable sources (other than Hodges) to support that.
This is not true. Numerous activists were active in both Bassiri's movement and in the Polisario, and Polisario has from the very start referred to him as a father of the nation, and his Zemla riots as a pivotal moment for the decision to enter into armed struggle (the organization of what would later become Polisario began only months after it happened). All of the books mentioned below, that discuss the Polisario, detail these connections. Hodges, by the way, is one of the main (I'd say THE main, or who else?) authorities on the background of the organization, so you can't dismiss him out of hand like that.
No, Refering to someone in what you do does not make you together in one basket. Bassiri was protesting against Spain's colonialism, and he was killed by the Spanish way before there were any Polisario. Then "almost" all Polisario's founders were inside Morocco either in the South (Tantan) or studying in Rabat. So when they started the Polisario front, it is normal they looked backward to some model, and the closest to mind was Bassiri. Of course, they also were inspired by their fathers, the veterans of the Moroccan Liberation Army in The South who fought for the reunification of the Saguia Hamra and Rio de Oro to the motherland, under Sultan Mohamed V. I have a video, where many veterans relate their memories, about how they fought for their country, Morocco, and about their biggest of memories, the visit of Mohamed V to Mhamid Alghizlane where they vowed, they would not spare anything to reunite under his throne. But to say that Polisario is a "continuation" of Bassiri's movement is wrong and misleading.--A Jalil 14:04, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Withdrawal of Spain

  • "Moroccan and Mauritanian troops invaded and occupied the Western Sahara and expelled most of its native population.". The Polisario front says the refugees FLED to Algeria. Here we have someone sick enough to even contradict the Polisario front and claim Morocco/Mauritania expelled the civilians, though the majority of Sahrawis currently live under Moroccan Administration. Algeria was involved in displacing civilians to Tindouf, and Algerian military was engaging in direct confrontation with the Moroccan Royal Forces deep inside Western Sahara (Amgala, 1976).
Well, that's the Moroccan view: that nasty Algeria went in and kidnapped Sahrawis, placed them in the monstrous death camps of Tindouf, and then brainwashed them to fight Morocco (thanks to cosmic mind-warping rays provided by Fidel Castro and the Free Masons, of course). I'm okay with removing "expelled" in favour of the pitifully neutral third voice's "were displaced", just to avoid more debate, though it is in many cases certainly accurate, but not to remove references to invasion. Because an invasion it was, with fighting. Arre 22:15, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
The "View" you are saying is not the Moroccan one and has never been said by any Moroccan official or unofficial. Algeria did indeed made it clear it will do its utmost for the Sahara not to be part of Morocco; and has provided political and military support to the guerillas. Algeria, and you know it, attempted at the beginning to set foot in the Sahara, but was defeated at Amgala, 1976. The official reason for the presence of Algerian troops in Amgala, more than 300 Km deep inside the Sahara, is to help the refugees to safety. One needs to have a very low IQ to not understand that it means they were giving a ride to the refugees, in other words, displacing them from their land to Tindouf. So who is to blame for the displacement??. Those that were far enough have stayed home and are still in their homes in Layoune, Dakhla, Boujdour, etc. Why did not Morocco displaced them like the others, if it was Morocco who was displacing??. As to Fidel, there are many former Polisarians in Morocco that can silence you with what they endured in the Cuban ordeal. Separation from their families, and spending years in Cuba without seeing them, and forced to swallow the Marxist ideology of atheism that is contradictory with their strong Islamic backgrounds, etc. As to invasion, you surely believe that Morocco was sending its troops to a land that is not his. Well that is not the neutral POV, for, Morocco was in the eyes of many others sending troops to Saguia Alhamra and Rio de Oro on the same basis they were sent to Tarfaya and Tantan, and Ifni. So keep that word invasion specific to Polisario sites, but not on Wikipedia.--A Jalil 14:04, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Morocco and Mauritania took control of their respective sectors in accordance with the MADRID ACCORDS. This was not mentionned and is now added.
In favour of mentioning the M. A, but not of portraying that as some uncontroversial agreement -- they hold zero value in international law, and the invasion took place in spite of an ICJ ruling which called for letting the inhabitants themselves decide. Arre 22:15, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
The Madrid Accords are mentionned without any special portrayel. different opinions about the treaty did exist, and that is normal given the fact that it created a situation not in favor of some. But sticking some's opinion here as a judgement on the MA is unacceptable.--A Jalil 14:04, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
  • The ICJ opinion has been and is still used by the different parties to support their claims, each focusing on the sentences that suit them. Morocco on the fact that there were allegiance ties with Sahrawi tribes (Allegiance = Beyaa in Islam is what makes an individual member of a community), Mauritania on similar relations to other Sahrawi tribes in Rio De Oro, and the Polisario/Algeria on the fact that self-determination should still take place.
The ICJ opinion says explicitly that there ARE ties to Morocco, but that these ARE NOT enough to negate self-determination, meaning that neither Morocco or Mauritania could just go in and take a chunk of the territory without consulting the inhabitants. You can't refer to the first part only, that's not a fair way of quoting the document.Arre 22:15, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
That is the Algeria/Polisario POV that takes the ICJ opinion out of its circumstantial context. The ICJ was asked for an opinion by Morocco I guess, in an effort to stop Spain from going ahead of staging a theatrical show that was called a referendum to make the territory a formally independent entity, but inderectly subordinate to Spain, and using it at the same time, as an argument against Morocco, that if The Sahara was Moroccan for less than a century ago, is becoming no more so, how could Morocco demand the return of Ceuta and Meillia that were Moroccan the last time more than 4 centuries ago, i.e. removing the argument of the historical rights. So the ICJ took in the case when there were a process of so called self-determination in progress with the spanish referendum. The court gave its opinion, where it confirmed that Moroccco's and Mauritania's claims for the territory were not coming from nothing, but based on historical ties. And so as not to be an obstacle against the ongoing process, the ICJ added (and that had nothing to do with the 2 questions it was asked) something like in simple language: Here I answered what you asked, but continue doing or not doing what you wanted to do, as if I (the ICJ) did not say anything. In the Islamic tradition, the Beyaa, is the act by which one is a member of a community. So Morocco ( and Mauritania till it officially abandoned its claims in 1979) is in his right to claim the Sahara as his. The Polisario/Algeria, of course, focused not on the answers of the ICJ to the 2 questions, but on its statments for the record that the answers were only advisory and should not alter anything that was under consideration or underway (in this case self-determination referendum). I hope you look at it from a different perspective than the Algeria/Polisario one.--A Jalil 14:04, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic

I added that

  • "a parliament and a judiciary, all based in Algeria". That is a fact. all SADR institutions are in Algeria.
  • "Abdelaziz has been its president for more than three decades". This is a fact. Abdelaziz has been in office for more than 3 decades (August, 1976- )(We are in November 2006).
  • the number of countries to still recognize the SADR is 43. "and has been acknowledged as a state by over 70 states although". more than 70, is not the same as more than 80.
No problem with this, except its 44 states now with Haiti, and that the first edit should make clear the institutions are based in the Sahrawi autonomous areas around Tindouf, not in Algiers or suchlike.Arre 22:15, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
Congratulations for the Haitian case. As to "the Sahrawi autonomous areas around Tindouf", this is the first time I hear something like that. There are autonomous regions in Algeria, the Kabyls, did you hear the call?.--A Jalil 14:04, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Algeria and Polisario

  • "defected" changed to returned: Lehbib Ayoub declared he returned to his country in response to the king's call and because he saw how Algeria proposed a partition of Western Sahara in 2001 to James Baker. If Lehbib Ayoub and Hadrami etc. say they "returned", who in the world can be so ridiculous to qualify their return of "defection" or "left the ranks of .."

--A Jalil 14:16, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

If someone left from Western Sahara and then entered Morocco, he didn't "return" to Morocco except in the eyes of Moroccan expansionist nationalism -- if Lahbib Ayoub now adheres to that, fine, but Wikipedia should remain neutral on the issue. Arre 22:15, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
Well this is the kind of headache that I most hate: No Mr Ayoub, you said you returned,but I say no you did not. You departed, .. wait, you left, or shall I say, you took off, or .. well wait Mr Ayoub, I will think for you for the right terminology that suits your return to your land. For once, to put it correctly, he did not "left from" Western Sahara, but "disappeared/vanished/evaporated" from Tindouf, Algeria. So he should be returning to Morocco from Algeria, that is right?. As to Moroccan expansionist imperialist colonialist *ist ... nationalism , wow I am impressed. All that without Gas/Petro-dollars nor nuclear arms. They are great the Moroccans.--A Jalil 14:04, 1 December 2006 (UTC)


Fine by me. ¦ Reisio 02:30, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
Some fine, some un-fine by me. As seen above. But I'll avoid an immediate revert -- hopefully A. Jalil can have a look at the portions we disagree on, and make it acceptable to all? Arre 22:15, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
Arre, please spare yourself the pain, and us with you. The anarchy you used to fill the Morocco related articles with anti-Morocco rethoric is over. I am not putting pro-Morocco stuff either, but we can be sure none will be.--A Jalil 14:04, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

The photography showing a demonstration claims to be in Madrid, but the banners show messages in Catalan, not in Castilian Spanish, and some of the flags are the Aragonese "quatri-barrada". This makes me think the demonstration could have only taken place in a Catalan town, presumably Barcelona.

[edit] NPOV and redlinks

NPOV It is POV to say that Polisario are a rebel group looking to separate Western Sahara from Morocco. First of all, they were founded to fight Spanish colonialism. Furthermore, this wording implies that the Moroccan POV is correct. Also, why would you delete the {{main}} template? Why do you insist on inserting a mass of redlinks into the article? Anyone can just go to the main and see the list himself. It would be one thing if there was a short list of particular notable individuals, but none of them are (hence, they have no articles), so there is no point in flooding the section with all these redlinks. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 16:29, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

  • Things are more complex than this polisarian simplicism
  • The liberation armee were to fight the spanish colonialism and the free Western Sahara as part of Morocco and like the other parts that have been freed from colonialism
  • Polisario founders are their children that have been gotten by Algeria, Libya and Cuba to fight the monarchy in Morocco.
  • A reason why marxist leninists were friends of polisario.
  • Otherwise how can you explain that all polisario founders have lived and studied in Morocco? And that their parents were members in the Moroccan Armee of Liberation?
  • How can you explain that the father of M. Abdelaziz, the boss of polisario, has always lived and is still living in Morocco? And that he is a fighter for the Moroccan Sahara?
  • Is that separation and rebelion enough to you to understand?
wikima 20:11, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
Okay Again, that doesn't address the issues I raised about language. To call Polisario a "separatist" group is to assume that they are trying to separate something in the first place. They don't consider themselves separatists, and only Morocco does, so calling them that is POV. That is true regardless of where they went to school or all of the other irrelevant assertions that you made above. You also ignored my simple and direct questions; do you care to answer them? -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 17:39, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
  • I don't know what they consider themselves, prophets? I don't care about them as I am convinced that they simply work for the algerian gov., and that the latter is the main actor in the conflict in face of Morocco. This is my personal view, as I express it in the talk.
  • What is to be taken into consideration are facts. And the facts say that they have been Moroccans who have lived and studied in Morocco, and that their families have been and are still Moroccans.
  • Facts also say that Polisario founders did not even fight for the independence in the beginning but only wanted to free the Sahara (as part of Morocco) from Spain.
  • They started to become separatists when they felt the monarchy was ignoring them and their claims.
  • They were in the best condition to be hired by Algeria, Libya and Cuba (and other communist countires) to be used for the sovietic block against the pro-capitalist Moroccan monarchy.
  • This is how things look like. But now that the wall has fallen, everybody like you is trying to talk them clean and present them as honnorable independence fighters. Which is rubbish of course.
wikima 21:51, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
Polisario What they are is exactly what they and the UN say they are: a nationalist group. They were founded not to be prophets, and not by Algeria, to be a Sahrawi nationalist group seeking an independent state. Some members of Polisario are from Morocco; again, I don't see how that's relevant. I have no idea where you get this idea that the Polisario was founded to integrate the Sahara into Morocco. That is patently absurd. Regardless of your untenable conspiracy theory, it is improper, inaccurate, and POV to call them a separatist group: that is not how they identify themselves, it is not how third parties label them, and it only represents the POV of Morocco. That's to say nothing of calling them "rebels" which is essentially meaningless, and the fact that you again, still ignored some very simple questions that I posed to you. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 22:18, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
  • I think you should learn more about Polisario before telling such absurdities.
  • The UN can register any organisation that wants to be party in the conflict.
  • You can also form a group and go to claim WS in the UN. If you have a petro-country and its diplomacy behind you may have chances to enter negociations and let yourself be named "nationalist movement".
  • The UN does not recognize the so called "sadr", but Polisario or any other organisation can register itself as party.
  • If you think that it does not matter and that it is irrelevant that for example the father of the Polisario boss Abdelaziz always lived and still lives in Morocco and that he, a member of the moroccan liberation armee and of CORCAS, is a fervent militant of the Moroccanity of the Sahara, then you are mising ignorance with absurdity!
wikima 22:28, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
Missing the point Where Mohammed Abdelaziz's dad lives is irrelevant to the point that I am making, just like everything else you just posted. If it is true that Polisario were founded to integrated the Sahara into Morocco, it should be easy for you to find a source for this information. Where did you first learn this? Also, do you care to address the questions that I initially asked you? Lastly, I have no idea what you mean by the UN registering parties and then parties registering themselves and whatever else it is you're trying to prove exactly, but, again, that is all irrelevant to the discussion at hand and the article itself. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 22:41, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
  • I know we are discussing the biography of his dad (though it would make a beautiful article) but the histroical background of this organisation
  • The example of his dad is not unique, they have been all of them living in Morocco and their parents were fighting to free the Sahara from Spain, for Morocco and not to be independent. This is one of the reasons why these sahraouis kept that aim in thier heads, and mixed it later with left-wing ideology.
  • You want a source, here is one that I could find instantly. May be others will follows: http://www.telquel-online.com/221/maroc2_221.shtml
  • Read the section at the last with the title "Aux origines du polisario. 'Si le Maroc nous avait compris…' "
  • This guy is one of the ideological creators of Polisario and now Nr 2 in CORCAS
  • In one of the very first demonstration to free the Sahara, they were shouting "Nous sommes les soldats de Hassan II jusqu'à la libération du pays", which means "We are the soliders of Hassan II until the country is free".
  • These are realities and facts you won't read in your famous books from "the friend of the sahara" & co.
  • So, either you don't know enough about the topic, which makes it really problematic since you're editing and reverting every thing, and you present yourself as the "fighter for the truth".
  • Or you are just acting, which is worse.
  • Assuming good faith I believe the first is true. Then it's time for you to learn!
wikima 14:55, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
Returning Revisiting this discussion, I see a host of non-sequiturs and no justification for why you keep on reverting to a mutilated version of this article. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 02:43, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
For starters, why would you always insert "nationalist" to describe the Polisario. I understand that they describe themselves as such, but that is their problem. Everyone can describe itself as one likes. Many terrorist organizations describe themselves as resistance and so on. For Morocco the Polisario is a separatist because Abdelaziz is Moroccan and so is Hadrami, elouali, ...etc. so actually that is closer to the correct terminology, but the term rebel is more neutral and is the correct one. As to the red links, Wikipedia is full of them, and what is needed is to make them blue, not to remove them.--A Jalil 08:08, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
POV They are a nationalist group, that is why I describe them as such. "Rebel group" doesn't mean anything, and implies that they exist to rebel against Morocco, which is not true. Also, the claim that they seek to separate Western Sahara from Morocco assumes that it is a part of Morocco. Clearly, those are POV terms. In point of fact, you admit just that by writing "[f]or Morocco the Polisario [are] separatist[s]." Many terrorist groups define themselves in many ways; that's not particularly relevant to anything. As far as the redlinks go, I have no problem with some existing, but there are a ridiculous amount inserted in this article. That also does not explain why you would revert away the {{main}} template, or reinsert the preponderance of brackets in the intro. Why would you do that? (*awaits response that he finds unlikely.) -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 04:10, 20 September 2007 (UTC)