AFRICAN UNION
UNION AFRICAINE
UNIÃO AFRICANA
African Commission on Human & Peoples’ Rights
Kairaba Avenue, P. O. Box 673, Banjul, The Gambia
Commission Africaine des Droits de l’Homme & des Peuples
Tel: (220) 4392 962; Fax: (220) 4390 764
E-mail: achpr@achpr.org; Website: http://www.achpr.org
AFRICAN COMMISSION ON
HUMAN AND PEOPLES’ RIGHTS
MISSION REPORT BY COMMISSIONER KAMEL REGAZ BARA
IN THE DEMOCRATIC ARAB SAHRAWI REPUBLIC (MATTER
CONCERNING THE EXPULSION OF SUB SAHARAN MIGRANTS)
(from 28 October to 2 November 2005)
I-
Introduction:
1. At the invitation of the Government of the Democratic Arab Sahrawi Republic
conveyed through their Embassy in Algeria, in my capacity as Member of the African
Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR), responsible for the promotion
in the region, and on the approval of the Chairperson of the ACHPR, I travelled to the
liberated territories of the Western Sahara, from the 28th October to 2nd November
2005, to investigate the situation of more than a hundred migrants originating from the
countries of sub-Saharan Africa, who have been expelled, deported and abandoned by
the Moroccan Authorities in the middle of the desert, beyond the “so-called defence”
wall, which separates the occupied territories from the liberated territories of Western
Sahara.
2. I arrived in the evening of the 28th October 2005 at Tindouf, at the extreme South
East of Algeria and I travelled to the region of Rabbouni, headquarters of the
Government of the Democratic Arab Sahrawi Republic where I had contacts with the
Sahrawi Authorities responsible for the dossier, notably the Government’s Legal
Counsel, Mr. Ahmed Sidi Ali.
3. The following days had been devoted to site visits and to different meetings with the
deported migrants and with the representatives of the UNMWS (United Nations
Mission in Western Sahara) and humanitarian NGOs active in the region.
II-
BRIEF BACKGROUND OF THE POLITICAL SITUATION OF THE
WESTERN SAHARA
4. The United Nations have considered the Western Sahara as non autonomous. It is
among the territories to be decolonised, in application of the Resolution 1514 of 12
December 1960 and is on the agenda of the Commission of Decolonisation, which
adopts on a yearly basis, a resolution to reaffirm the right of the peoples of the Western
Sahara to self determination as the General Assembly approves it at each of its sessions.
5. A plan of settlement was adopted in 1991, which provides for the organisation of a
referendum of self-determination. That plan was approved by the two parties to the
conflict, that is the Kingdom of Morocco and the Front Polisario but the plan is in a
standoff as a result of the hindrances put by the Kingdom of Morocco. A plan of
settlement of the matter prepared in 2003 by Mr. James Baker, the Special Envoy of the
UN Secretary General and adopted by the Security Council was also blocked by
Moroccan authorities, who claim full sovereignty on the territory of Western Sahara.
6. For the African Union, the DASR has the status of Member State since 1986 and it
participates as member in the conferences and activities of intergovernmental
institutions and specialised agencies of the AU.
III-
INFORMATION COLLECTED AND OBSERVATIONS MADE:
7. For several years now a large movement of migrants from sub-Saharan African
countries trying to enter Europe has been getting together and increasing in volume and
using either the West land route which goes through the Spanish Enclaves of Ceuta and
Mellila, through Algeria and Morocco, or the East land route which goes through Libyan
territory to reach the Italian Island of Lampedusa. This movement also uses either the
maritime route by means of makeshift boats (called pateras) to cross the Strait of
Gibraltar, or reach the Canary Islands from the Sahrawi town of El Ayoune.
8. Networks of smugglers who are perfectly organised and often benefit from local
accomplices have been established to carry on a racket with regard to these migrants
under the pretext of helping them to realise their objective of reaching Europe by all
available means.
9. Throughout the length of their route, these migrants have created meeting points in the
form of informal villages and shanty towns largely in the outskirts of the Cities of Gao
(Niger), Tin Zaouatine, Tamanrasset or Maghnia (Algeria) and in Oujda, Nador and
Tangiers (Morocco).
10. Following a rumour which put forward the intention of the Spanish Authorities to raise
the walls with barbed-wire surrounding the Enclaves of Ceuta and Mellila from 3 to 6
metres, the African candidates intent on clandestine emigration and stationed in the
Moroccan regions of Nador and Oujda organised, from the 28th September 2005,
attempts to scale the wired walls by force. This was to be done by waves of several
hundreds of individuals who, using the cover of darkness and wooden ladders, launched
themselves against the wired walls. These clandestine migrants came up against very
strong opposition from the Spanish Authorities and very harsh suppression from the
Moroccan Authorities.
11. In effect, it has been established that the Moroccan Police, supported by Units of the
National Gendarmerie, fired live bullets on the persons from sub-Saharan Africa,
clandestine immigrants, on the 28th, 29th and 30th September 2005, killing dozens of
them and wounding several dozens more.
12. Following this the Moroccan Authorities embarked on a major campaign of arrests and
forced expulsions of the thousands of Africans intending to enter Europe through
clandestine means.
13. Confined in the precincts and garrisons of the National Gendarmerie, a certain number
of these migrants, largely of Senegalese, Malian, Cameroonian or Nigerian nationality
were forcibly repatriated by air on the flights of Royal Air Maroc, chartered by the
Moroccan Authorities.
14. Several thousands of them (four to five thousand) were brutally repulsed to beyond the
Algerian border in the region which separates Oudjda in Morocco to Maghnia in Algeria.
Taken care of by the Algerian Authorities, they were sent back, mostly by land, towards
the region of Tin Zaouatine at the border between Algeria and Niger.
15. For reasons difficult to extrapolate, the Moroccan Authorities decided to repulse close to
200 of these migrants of various nationalities towards what they call their “Saharan
Provinces”. Relieved of their papers, stripped of their personal effects and handcuffed in
twos, these clandestine migrants had been placed in a special convoy of four buses and
driven to the region of Nador in the North of Morocco towards the region of Agadir
and Rachidia in the South.
16. They were then handed over to the Gendarmerie and driven after a painful trip of close
to four days in the region of El Ayoune and Smara in Western Sahara where they were
handed over to the Military Authorities. The latter conveyed them to the edge of the
territory close to the so-called defence wall strewn with anti-personnel mines, which
separates the zone of Western Sahara controlled by Morocco from that controlled by
Units of the Polisario and known as the “freed territories”.
17. The Moroccan Military Authorities divided them into groups and after having opened
passages through the so-called defence wall for them, compelled them at gun point, to
cross the wall and gave each group a few loaves of bread, tins of sardines and a bottle of
water. To reassure them, the said Authorities falsely informed them that the Algerian
and Mauritanian borders were only a few kilometres away in the East and South of the
so-called defence wall. As soon as the groups were sufficiently far from the wall, and still
menaced at gun point, the Moroccan Authorities wiped away all traces of the passage of
these migrant groups in order to prevent them from coming back, in fear of stepping on
a mine.
18. During our travel to these areas, we visited the places of accommodation provided for
these migrants at Bir Lahlou and M’hiriz and discussed at length with them and with
their representatives who were grouped according to nationality.
19. The migrants that we met confirmed that they had all wandered around with neither
objective nor direction for three to four days in the desert before being found either by
Units of the Polisario or by UNMWS Observers.
20. The migrants also confirmed that several groups of about dozen persons each, including
two women, from whom they had been separated at the time of their deportation and
dumping in the middle of the desert, were missing.
21. Finally, several of the migrants confirmed that they were legal residents in Morocco
where they had been registered as Asylum Seekers by the Office of the United Nations
High Commissioner for Refugees (HCR) in Casablanca. They reported that they could
no longer show evidence of their legal situation since the Moroccan Authorities had
stripped and relieved them of all their documents and personal effects.
22. When we met them the situation of these migrants was as follows:
A-
Total number of migrants from Sub-Saharan Africa lodged in
Polisario Camps : 115 with 95 in the Bir Lahlou Base and 20 in
M’hiriz Base.
B-
Distribution by Nationality:
•
•
•
•
•
•
Gambians
:
Nigerians
:
Cameroonians :
Ghanaians
Ivorians
Burkinabe
50
22
18
:
:
:
09
04
03
•
•
•
•
Malians
Bissau-Guineans
Guineans
Sudanese
:
:
:
:
03
02
02
01
23. On humanitarian grounds the Sahrawi Authorities provided the migrants with a Doctor
to monitor their medical and hygienic conditions. During a meeting we had with this
Doctor, he told us that apart from the state of shock and general stress, the migrants
were suffering from various illnesses which included anaemia, skin diseases and high
blood pressure.
24. In collaboration with certain humanitarian agencies including the Spanish Red Cross and
OXFAM, the Sahrawi Red Crescent and the local branch of the UNMWS provided the
migrants with clothes, blankets and various commodities which included sanitary
products and basic food stuff, which placed them on the same level as the Sahrawis in
the Polisario refugee camps.
25. The political Authorities of the DASR contacted all the Institutions empowered to
intervene in such cases, notably the African Union, the United Nations and the HCR.
They also informed us that they had contacted the home countries of these migrants
through their Embassies in Addis Ababa, so as to determine the conditions of their
repatriation in the near future.
IV-
RECOMMENDATIONS:
Following my Mission on the ground and in view of the information gathered as well as
the observations made I wish to recommend to the African Commission:
•
To strongly denounce the violations of the basic rights of the migrants from
Sub-Saharan Africa, notably by the Moroccan Authorities;
•
To express its gratitude to the Authorities of the DASR for their exemplary
humanitarian behaviour which saved these migrants from certain death;
•
To adopt a Resolution denouncing the alarming situation of these migrants and
underscoring the fact that to deal with this matter from a purely security point of
view through the cooperation of the Police in the countries North and South of
the Mediterranean will be futile in the absence of a genuine policy of partnership
based on the economic and social development of these migrants’ countries of
organ.
•
Call upon the competent organs and instances of the Commission of the AU to
bring support and coordinate efforts with the view to addressing the situation of
the migrants and ensuring their repatriation to their respective countries of
origin, or to the country of their choice.
Authorities met during the mission :
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
HE Mr. Mohamed Abdelaziz, President of the Republic of the DASR;
HE the Minister of Justice ;
The Special Adviser of the Government of the DASR;
The Chargé d’Affaires of the Embassy of DASR in Algiers;
The President of the Sahrawi Red Crescent;
The Head of the MINURSO in Tindouf and Bir Lahlou ; and
The Representative of the Spanish Red Cross Antenna in the Sahrawi refugee
camps.