PRESS BRIEFING BY SECRETARY-GENERAL'S SPECIAL REPRESENTATIVE
Press Briefing
PRESS BRIEFING BY SECRETARY-GENERAL'S SPECIAL REPRESENTATIVE
19980204
FOR WESTERN SAHARA
At a Headquarters' press briefing this afternoon, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Western Sahara, Charles Dunbar, said the referendum for self-determination in Western Sahara -- scheduled to be held in early December 1998 -- would be "free and fair" and would be open to international observation.
Mr. Dunbar began his press briefing by saying that he was a newcomer to the United Nations and was honoured to have been chosen by the Secretary- General as the Special Representative for Western Sahara. He said he had been asked because of his long-time diplomatic service with the United States State Department. He had spent seven years working around that region -- two years in Morocco, three years in Algeria, and two in Mauritania. During that period, he had been present at the beginnings of the Western Sahara issue. In 1974-1975, he had been in Morocco at the time the opinion of the International Court of Justice had been sought and received, and he had then been in Algiers at the time of the Green March, in which Moroccan civilians had taken control of the territory, along with Mauritanians taking control in the South.
The United Nations had been involved in the conflict for approximately six years, Mr. Dunbar said. It was important to recognize the progress that had been made during that period, as some people failed to do. A total of 60,000 voters had been identified as eligible or ineligible to vote -- this was out of 75,000 voters who had been convoked; 15,000 had not shown up. The process -- which had broken down in late 1995 -- had resumed again with the appointment by the Secretary-General of James A. Baker III as his Personal Envoy. The fact that there was an agreement to hold a referendum within a year was due to the great negotiating skill of Mr. Baker.
A total of 22,000 more people had now been identified, Mr. Dunbar said. It was important to bear in mind that those people had been identified as eligible or ineligible according to one of the five criteria set out in the settlement plan. Who was eligible and who was not would not be published until the end of the identification process -- at the end of May.
Mr. Dunbar said that in January it had been decided to convoke members of three contested tribes who had been identified during the 1974 Spanish census, and 4,000 people had shown up. They would be identified over the course of this month, as would members of other, non-contested tribes.
Great numbers of people would continue to be identified every day, Mr. Dunbar continued. However, the outcome would very much depend upon whether the two parties, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Saguia el-Hamra and Rio de Oro (POLISARIO) and the Government of Morocco, wanted the
process to go forward. They had told Mr. Baker in no uncertain terms that they wanted a referendum to take place within a fixed period of time -- that was the spirit of Houston. As was natural, of course, the two parties were strongly contending various aspects of the process.
"It's our job to keep on identifying people", Mr. Dunbar said. There were other problems that lay ahead. He was focusing on what needed to be done between now and the end of May.
A correspondent asked whether most of the people had returned after the Green March. Mr. Dunbar said, "My sense is that most of them did go back, yes. A Green Marcher -- I just want to make this entirely clear -- would not necessarily be eligible to be identified and found eligible to vote. The Green Marcher would have to be found eligible under one of the five criteria." Large numbers of those people had gone back, although there had been other settlers who had come in since then.
Are there still expatriates coming in from Tindouf or has it stopped? the correspondent asked. Mr. Dunbar said that his understanding was that most of the traffic involving Tindouf had been in the other direction; shortly after the Green March, people had left the Western Sahara and become refugees.
Were any of those people coming back to vote? "Yes, that would be the idea", Mr. Dunbar responded. "They are being identified in Tindouf."
Asked whether that process was continuing, Mr. Dunbar said, "Yes. And that's the point. I think there already has been and will continue to be a lot of atmospherics, and this is entirely natural. These are two contending parties who have a very different view of what the outcome of this process should be."
Responding to another question, Mr. Dunbar said that a very important issue at this stage of the process was the contested tribes -- members of three tribes, token numbers of whom had been present in the Sahara in 1974 and had been counted in the Spanish census.
Is the problem of identifying the voters logistical or political? a correspondent asked. Mr. Dunbar said it was both. The logistics were hard. Both parties agreed that it could be difficult for convoked people to arrive on fixed days. The issue of contested tribes was profoundly political and involved the whole question of what one considered the Western Sahara to be and to have been.
On another question, Mr. Dunbar said that the referendum was scheduled for early December. It should be held around that time. There might be a slippage of a few weeks. The issue of identifying the 4,000 people slowed things down.
Western Sahara Briefing - 3 - 4 February 1998
Mr. Dunbar then said he wished to make some points that he had forgotten to make at the beginning of the briefing. The first involved the role played by sheikhs of the particular tribes in the process. A certain number of people had to pass in front of those sheikhs in order to be identified -- a process that could not be sped up simply by trying harder. There had been complaints regarding the comportment of the sheikhs of the two sides and that had found its way into the media. It was important to bear in mind that it was not the sheikhs who decided who would be identified. While they did give their views, it was up to the Identification Commission to make the determination.
It was important to emphasize that there was also a great deal of cooperation and understanding on both sides in the process, Mr. Dunbar said. Further, it might be possible to over-analyse what would happen in advance, and to draw conclusions about the results of the referendum that might not be warranted.
* *** *