from Sahara Press Service
The Danish Organization Africa Contact launched today the “ACT NOW” Campaign to release the Agdeim Izik group and all the Saharawi political prisoners who have been imprisoned in different Moroccan prisons, because of their political opinions concerning Western Sahara issue, the last colony in Africa, according to a source from Polisario Representation in Copenhagen.
“With this Campaign, we wish to focus attention on, and demand justice for, not only Sidahmed Lemjayed, but also the other Saharawi political prisoners together with whom he was sentenced. We also wish to send a strong message to the Moroccan government, that the world will not simply stand by while Morocco continues to colonize Western Sahara, brutalize its native population, steal its resources and devastate its environment”, Africa Contact’s Political Chairperson, Mads Barbesgaard said in a press release.
Africa Contact also recalled the reasons for the unfair imprisonment of the Agdeim Izik group. “The Agdeim Izik protest camp protested against Moroccan human rights violations, discrimination against the Saharawis, and to call for an improved standard of living for the Saharawi people in occupied Western Sahara, and to demand the referendum on the status of Western Sahara that the UN and Morocco have promised the Saharawis for decades.”
Polisario Representative in Denmark, Mr. Abba Malainin, expressed his appreciation for Africa Contact’s campaign to release the Agdeim Izik Group, further stating, “The Saharawis under Morocco’s occupation have been subjected to all kinds of human rights violations in their own country and these violations are increasing. All these abuses have been documented by the well-known human rights Organizations, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Freedom House and Robert Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights”.
“The latest wave of repression, a brutal Moroccan crackdown on peaceful Saharawi protests last week-end in the cities of Laayun and Smara, while the UN Envoy, Christopher Ross was in his third tour to the region of North Africa in a bid to revive the UN efforts for a lasting solution for the issue of Western Sahara, is just another example of such human rights abuses”, said Malainin.
Mr. Malainin, concluded saying “It is high time that the UN Security Council gives a mandate to MINURSO to monitor and report about human rights in occupied Western Sahara. Western Sahara should not be the exception”.
