Western Sahara

Lord Howell of Guildford Excerpts

Thursday 25th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether their assessment of the situation in the Western Sahara has altered following the visit of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Alistair Burt, to Algeria this month; and what progress they hope to make relating to the region during their presidency of the United Nations Security Council.

[The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Howell of Guildford)]

My Lords, my honourable friend Alistair Burt, the Under-Secretary of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, had useful discussions in Algeria about Western Sahara, although these have not altered our overall assessment of the situation. We support UN-led efforts to resolve the dispute by encouraging the parties to negotiate a mutually acceptable solution. The progress of negotiations is slow, but we are committed to using our current presidency of the Security Council to advance a resolution. The Security Council convened on 16 November to discuss recent violence in the territory.

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his Answer. Does he agree that one of the difficulties is lack of pressure from the rest of the world due to the virtual ban on journalists and politicians visiting the camps where the Saharawis suffer so much? Will he take further steps through our presidency of the UN Security Council to see that that ban is lifted? Will he also support the call of Amnesty International for an independent inquiry into the recent violence, in which an unknown number of people died?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I thank my noble friend for her question. Yes, we are pressing further for better access to the protest camps to see exactly what went on and we are looking at reports from those on the ground. As to an independent commission, we support the idea of a human rights monitoring mechanism. Exactly how it would work is yet to be decided, but our Government have put forward a series of options as to how a commission should operate in what the diplomats call a “non-paper”—a term which I never quite understand. We have made a series of suggestions about how we should carry forward a human rights monitoring mechanism and how it would work to bring better pressure to bear in line with what my noble friend suggests.

[Lord Chidgey]

My Lords, is my noble friend aware—to take his point further—that after the deferral of the informal talks at the UN, reports are coming back that probably 36 people were killed and more than 700 injured when Moroccan security forces broke up a protest camp of the Saharawi people in Western Sahara? Does he share my concern that after four visits to the region by the UN envoy, Christopher Ross, it seems that his efforts may well follow the same fate as those of the earlier special envoy, James Baker, who after four years saw his plans come to nothing? Finally, will the Government use their best efforts to ensure that the previous ideas are brought forward again—that is, to introduce an autonomous Western Sahara authority, with the idea of following it as soon as possible with a referendum on Saharawi independence?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

We most certainly share the concern, which is demonstrated by the fact that, as we have current presidency this November of the UN Security Council, we have made a special point of raising the issue and seeing how pressure can be applied. That is the right way forward, and we will proceed on that basis. Will my noble friend repeat his second point, because I want to answer it?

[Lord Chidgey]

I thank the Minister for that opportunity. I am seeking an assurance that the Government will press for the resurrection of the previous concept of the Baker plan, which was, first, to establish an autonomous Western Sahara authority, with a view to following that in due course with a referendum on independence for the Saharawi people.

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

We want the referendum, but we do not make a prejudgment on the different solutions, of which autonomy would certainly be one. We want to see the Saharawi people of Western Sahara in a position to determine their own future via a referendum, whatever model then results. Certainly that is our aim.

[Lord Richard]

My Lords, can I help the Minister as to what a non-paper is? It is a document that sets out your policy without any commitment to be bound by it. Perhaps the best analogy is the Liberal Democrat manifesto at the last election.

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I am sure that the noble Lord’s vast diplomatic experience can be applied on a whole range of issues in all parties and all sides of the House, as well as in the political establishment generally. I am very grateful to him for explaining to me more clearly an area that I did know about, but with which he is more familiar than I am. When these phrases come up, I always want to establish exactly what they involve. In this case, the paper contains a very firm and useful series of suggestions about how we take the human rights monitoring mechanism forward, and I believe that it will form a basis for a more constructive approach than we have had generally in the past on this whole unhappy issue.

[Lord Steel of Aikwood]

Does my noble friend agree that this whole saga does not reflect very well on the United Nations organisation? It must be more than 15 years since I visited the temporary refugee camps in Algeria. Is there any news from the last visit that Mr Ross made to the region and the talks that went on in New York between the Polisario Front and the Moroccan Government earlier this month?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I do not think that there has been vast progress. I had the opportunity to have discussions with Ambassador Ross, and we talked about the disappointments of the past and the lack of progress made. The situation has now flared up again because of the camps and the violence to which my noble friend Lord Chidgey has just alluded, which has reinforced the need for a serious and stronger approach by the UN. We seek to strengthen UN involvement to bring this long-standing dispute to some kind of conclusion.