Algeria Rejects MINURSO Vote, Forces Balanced UN Resolution on Western Sahara Self-Determination

NEW YORK (United Nations) – Following marathon negotiations in recent days, Algeria decided on Friday not to participate in the vote on the Security Council draft resolution renewing the mandate of the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO). Algeria deemed the text “below its expectations” and noted that it contained no explicit mention of the proposal by the Polisario Front, the sole and legitimate representative of the Sahrawi people.

Algeria’s decision came after intense negotiations conducted by its diplomacy on multiple fronts and in various capitals—notably Algiers, New York, and Washington—which succeeded in radically altering the content of the proposed text. These efforts established clear foundations and criteria aligned with the intent of the resolution’s penholder, the United States of America, to inject new momentum into resolving the conflict in the region between the Polisario Front and the Moroccan occupier.

Whereas the initial draft was clearly biased in favor of the Moroccan thesis, the resolution adopted today (Friday) was drafted to open the door to all proposals that may be submitted by both parties. It emphasizes that the final solution must fall within the framework of the United Nations Charter and the principles of international law, be mutually acceptable to both parties, and enable the Sahrawi people to exercise their right to self-determination.

The final version of the resolution reaffirms MINURSO’s role in supporting the efforts of the UN Secretary-General’s Personal Envoy to find a peaceful, mutually acceptable political solution between the two parties.

The final document also renewed MINURSO’s mandate for a period of one year, rather than the three-month period envisaged in the proposed text, while leaving open to the UN Secretary-General the possibility of reconsidering the mission’s future and mandate in light of the negotiation process between the parties.

Algeria succeeded in including a key element requiring the UN Secretary-General and his Personal Envoy to apply all relevant Security Council resolutions, thereby ending the practice in previous texts of referencing only resolutions adopted since 2007. The new text thus places all relevant Security Council resolutions on an equal footing.

According to several concordant sources, Algeria convinced a number of Security Council member states to exert pressure on the United States to remove language describing the Moroccan autonomy proposal as a “serious, credible, and realistic plan,” in addition to treating it as one option among others that parties may present in the negotiation process. This process, as stipulated in the resolution, must lead to the Sahrawi people’s exercise of their right to self-determination.

Algeria’s stance reaffirms its sovereignty in decision-making, its refusal to yield to any pressure or blackmail regardless of intensity or origin, and its unwavering commitment to defending the rights of oppressed peoples, including the Sahrawi people’s right to freely choose their destiny.