On May 22, occupation forces broke up a small sit-in in El Aaiun, the capital of Western Sahara. Family members of a Saharawi political prisoner and others were protesting the Moroccan authorities’ decision to move him from a jail in the occupied territories to one inside Morocco.

The prisoner, Sid Ahmed Mahmoud Haddi, is serving time after a conviction on charges of “insulting the monarchy” and “drug trafficking.” On hearing of the transfer, Haddi demanded he be moved instead to the camps in Algeria organized by the Polisario Front, the main organization that has led Western Sahara’s battle for independence.

The police attack on the sit-in sparked larger rallies in El Aaiun. The protests grew from several hundred to more than 1,000 by May 26, according to Afrol News, a press service sympathetic to the Saharawi independence movement. Demonstrators chanted “Long live the Polisario Front” and “Morocco out,” and held aloft the flag of the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic, the name Saharawis use for their land.

Occupation army and police forces were mobilized to confront the demonstrations, arresting and beating dozens. Despite the crackdown, mobilizations continued in El Aaiun. By May 27 protests were taking place in cities throughout the occupied territory and inside Morocco. In Rabat, Morocco’s capital, Saharawi students demonstrated on the university campus, and 12 were arrested and held for two days.

A May 29 Reuters dispatch reported that 33 youths had been charged by Moroccan authorities with criminal conspiracy, disturbing public order, and damage to public property.

The police have mobilized in the Saharawi neighborhoods of El Aaiun, breaking into houses and beating people they accused of having taken part in the protests. In the latest attack, on June 12 police chased down and threw from the top of a roof a 19-year-old Saharawi, who is reportedly in critical condition with back injuries.

The people of Western Sahara fought for decades for independence against Spain, the country’s colonial master until 1975. For the past 30 years they have resisted occupation by the Moroccan monarchy, which has been firmly backed by Washington, Madrid, and Paris.  
 
 
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