by STEPHEN ZUNES
Late last month, President Barack Obama met with Morocco’s King Mohammed VI in Washington for their first face-to-face meeting. The result was a bitter disappointment for supporters of human rights and international law.
Two days before the summit, Human Rights Watch (HRW) issued a statement calling on the U.S. president to tell the king that “U.S. support for the reform process in Morocco depends on moving beyond rhetoric and making tangible change.” Specifically, the human rights group called for “stronger legal protections for rights and an end to impunity for police who use violence and commit other abuses.”
Instead, according to a White House statement, Obama applauded the Moroccan monarch for “deepening democracy” and “promoting economic progress and human development.”
The most critical issue facing northwestern Africa involves Western Sahara, a sparsely populated country on the Atlantic coast that has been under Moroccan occupation since the kingdom invaded the former Spanish colony in 1975, just prior to its scheduled independence. Defying a series of UN Security Council resolutions, a landmark World Court decision, and international mediation efforts, the Moroccans have continued to deny the people of the territory their right of self-determination through a UN-sponsored referendum. No country recognizes Moroccan sovereignty over the territory, and more than 80 nations, as well as the African Union, have formally recognized Western Sahara as an independent state.
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