Foreign Policy Dec. 9, 2020 – It’s not often that Western Sahara makes international headlines, but in mid-November it did: Nov. 14 marked the tragic—if unsurprising—breakup of a tenuous, 29-year cease-fire in Western Sahara between the occupying Moroccan government and pro-independence fighters. The outbreak of violence is concerning not only because it flew in the face of nearly three decades of relative stasis, but also because Western governments’ reflexive response to the resurgent conflict may be to upend—and thereby hamper and delegitimize for perpetuity over 75 years of established international legal principles…
Category: Africa
Africa
Sudan’s Democratic Revolution is Being Undermined by the United States
By Stephen Zunes, June 20, 2020: Last year’s nonviolent pro-democracy revolution in Sudan which brought down the brutal 30-year dictatorship of Omar al-Bashir and the subsequent military junta inspired the world. Few popular uprisings in history faced such extremely difficult circumstances and few displayed the kind of courage, tenacity, and effective strategy by pro-democracy activists which led to their victory. Unfortunately, the United States has been pursuing policies which almost seem designed to destroy Sudan’s fragile democratic experiment…
INTERVIEW: The Sudanese Ousted a Dictator Last Year—Why Is Washington Still Imposing Sanctions?
The Nation and Rethinking Foreign Policy, March 20, 2020:
Middle East scholar Stephen Zunes… January 2020, traveled to Sudan to learn about the protest movement that ousted longtime dictator Omar al-Bashir last year. While the military regime Bashir headed is still a powerful force in Sudan, it has been pressed into sharing power with a civilian government in formation. Sudan’s future remains undecided… Sudan is still under strict US sanctions [d]espite now having a moderate, secular, civilian-led government… still listed as a state sponsor of terror. The U.S. spends billions to prop up a military dictatorship in Egypt and sells billions in arms to the Saudis and Emiratis in the Gulf, while a nearby democratic experiment is being punished by sanctions.
Sudan’s Democratic Revolution: How They Did It
Reposted April 2020 from Inside Arabia by ICNC,
Nonviolence International and The Conversation
Conditions under Sudan’s oppressive autocratic regime did not fit into what Western analysts see as the right ones for a successful pro-democracy civil resistance movement and yet they have emerged victorious—for now. Among other things, its success points to perhaps the single most important factor: nonviolent discipline…
How Sudan’s Pro-Democracy Uprising Challenges Prevailing Myths about Civil Resistance
International Center on Nonviolent Conflict, April 22, 2019: A powerful pro-democracy civil insurrection in Sudan which has ousted a longstanding dictator and his successor is still in progress, but Sudanese are hopeful for a full democratic transition…
INTERVIEW: Why Sudan’s Dictator Fell and What Comes Next?
On Rising Up With Sonali, Pacifica Radio network; April 12, 2019
DOWNLOAD AUDIO (MP3):
Western Sahara-Morocco dispute remains stalemated as federation proposal advanced
Stephen Zunes’ Testimony before the UN conference on decolonization
freedomsupport June 29, 2016: My interest in the dispute over Western Sahara is based not simply upon my belief in justice for that country’s people, but its implications in regard to international law and the principles upon which the United Nations organization is founded. These include the right of self-determination…
Morocco continues occupation of Western Sahara, in defiance of UN
National Catholic Reporter June 6, 2016: As Morocco continues to defy the UN, the International Court of Justice, and much of the international community in its continued occupation of Western Sahara, the United States continues supporting that autocratic government.
Reasons to oppose the proposed state anti-boycott bill
Santa Cruz Sentinel June 2, 2016: The California State Assembly is considering a bill entitled the “Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions of Recognized Sovereign Nations or Peoples Act” (AB 2844) that could lead to penalizing California businesses that boycott any country or any products from a particular country — even if the product is being made in a colony or occupied territory or if it is made under illegal, inhumane or environmentally deleterious conditions. It would also deny state or local government contracts to sole proprietorships who participate in such boycotts.
Africa’s Last Colony: Western Saharan Independence Movement Mourns Loss of Polisario Front Leader
Nobel Peace Prize spotlights National Dialogue Quartet
National Catholic Reporter November 20, 2015 [Also in the Free Library]
The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize December 10 to a group of four Tunisian civil society groups that played a key role in their country’s transition to democracy is a reminder of how Arab peoples are quite capable of the difficult work of navigating their nation from dictatorship to democracy…
Hillary Clinton, phosphates, and the Western Sahara
National Catholic Reporter May 12, 2015 [Also by the Huffington Post]
For more than a half-century, a series of UN resolutions and rulings by the International Court of Justice have underscored the rights of inhabitants of countries under colonial rule or foreign military occupation. Among these is the right to “freely dispose of their natural wealth and resources,” which “must be based on the principles of equality and of the right of peoples and nations to self-determination”…
The contrasting fates of Tunisia and Libya
National Catholic Reporter June 8, 2015 [and Common Dreams]
The people of Libya and Tunisia both overthrew long-standing dictatorships in popular uprisings in 2011. Four years later, the political situation in these neighboring states could not be more different. The reason has much to do with how their regimes were overthrown…
Obama Ignores Morocco’s Illegal Occupation and Human Rights Abuses
Foreign Policy In Focus, December 20, 2013
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.
Mandela’s utilitarianism and the struggle for liberation
Open Democracy, December 13, 2013
Republished by Huffington Post, International Center for Nonviolent Conflict, Scoop Independent News, New Zealand, and Dawson College Inspire Solutions Project.
While many western governments argued that the supposedly benevolent influence of western capital would lead to liberalization and an eventual end to South Africa’s apartheid system, and many on the left argued that liberation would come only through armed revolution, in fact it was largely unarmed resistance by the black majority and its supporters, both within South Africa and abroad, which proved decisive.
The Deteriorating Situation in Libya
On China Radio International October 22, 2013
The kidnapping and brief detention of the Libyan prime minister Ali Zeidan a couple of weeks back probably marked one of the lowest points for the civilian government in this vast country where, in the post-Gaddafi lawlessness, the situation seems to deteriorate by the week. It was also probably the point which showed the world just how prominent and daring these militias and various tribes are.
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Interview: “Blowback’s revenge” (video)
RT News September 27, 2013
Stephen Zunes joins a panel on CrossTalking that includes Kelley Vlahos, Richard Barrett to discuss whether the War on Terror actually generates more terrorists and victims. What are the lessons to be learned from the attack in Kenya? And, where is the logic in Washington indirectly backing Al-Qaeda in Syria and fighting terrorists elsewhere?
The Last Colony: Beyond Dominant Narratives on the Western Sahara Roundtable
Middle East Studies Pedagogy Initiative (MESPI) June 3, 2013
[Republished by Dagsavisen.no, Jadaliyya.com, JADMAG, and Transnational.org]
Western Sahara is a sparsely-populated territory about the size of Italy, on the Atlantic coast in northwestern Africa, just south of Morocco. Traditionally inhabited by nomadic Arab tribes, collectively known as Sahrawis and famous for their long history of resistance to outside domination, the territory was occupied by Spain from the late 1800s through the mid-1970s. With Spain holding onto the territory well over a decade after most African countries had achieved their freedom from European colonialism, the nationalist Polisario Front launched an armed independence struggle against Spain in 1973. This (along with pressure from the United Nations) eventually forced Madrid to promise the people of what was then still known as the Spanish Sahara a referendum on the fate of the territory by the end of 1975. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) heard irredentist claims by Morocco and Mauritania and ruled in October of 1975 that (despite pledges of fealty to the Moroccan sultan back in the nineteenth century by some tribal leaders bordering the territory, and close ethnic ties between some Sahrawi and Mauritanian tribes) the right of self-determination was paramount. A special visiting mission from the United Nations engaged in an investigation of the situation in the territory that same year and reported that the vast majority of Sahrawis supported independence under the leadership of the Polisario, not integration with Morocco or Mauritania.
Interview: Inside the Decades-Long Dispute over the Western Sahara (audio)
KBIA FM May 2, 2013: Panelists: Stephen Zunes, Professor of Politics and International Studies, University of San Francisco, and Luis de Vega, Reporter, ABC daily newspaper.
Western Sahara is nearly as big as its northern neighbor, Morocco, but in truth, this stretch of desert along the Atlantic Ocean may be Africa’s most overlooked territorial dispute…
Western Sahara is nearly as big as its northern neighbor, Morocco, but in truth, this stretch of desert along the Atlantic Ocean may be Africa’s most overlooked territorial dispute…