Historical and legal background In 1963, the UN General Assembly (UNGA) included Western Sahara in the list of Non Self-Governing Territories, to which UNGA Resolution 1514 (XXV) entitled “Declaration on the granting of Independence to colonial countries and peoples” applied. On 16 October 1975, the International Court of Justice released...
Soldiers, police officers, demonstrations and attacks are recurrent themes in Saharawi children’s drawings. A child’s drawing, as a spontaneous expression, represents a child’s thought processes and its perceptions of the world around it. Fear and sadness which children transmit through their creativity are a reflection on the systematic exposure to...
During his visit to the Kingdom of Morocco and Western Sahara in September 2012, Juan Méndez, UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, signaled that public prosecutors and judges rarely investigate complaints which allege the use of torture to obtain evidence or confessions during the early stages of interrogations. Juan Méndez stated:...
Morocco is a signatory to the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability which was adopted in 2006 and ratified by Morocco in 2009. Despite this, Saharawis with disabilities suffer doubly as a result of the Morrocan occupation of Western Sahara, not only through routine human rights violations...
1. Introduction One area Adala has focused on over the last two years is the situation of Saharawi political prisoners in Moroccan prisons. This report is based on direct observations by our members in the Occupied Territories, interviews with current political prisoners, their lawyers and family members, ex-political prisoners, as...
Introduction READ FULL REPORT The above-listed nongovernmental organizations and associations submit this report in connection with the Committee’s review of the Kingdom of Morocco’s implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) in the Non-Self-Governing Territory of Western Sahara. This report addresses the following rights enshrined in...
Introduction: The goal of the visit was to attend as an international observer the judicial appeals of the Saharawi political prisoners Mr. Abdelmotalib Sarir, Mr. Mohamed Barber and Mr. Alyien Moussaoui on the 28th of October 2014 in Laayoune’s court of appeal, and that of Mr. Abdallahi Boukioud on 3rd...
Introduction Between February and October 2014, members of Adala UK in Western Sahara interviewed more than 300 Saharawi children aged 4-17 and families living in the Occupied Territories to investigate the difficulties faced by Saharawi children. In October and November 2014, another member of Adala UK, visited the Occupied Territories...