OPINION

 

Sahrawis, POW's and the Issue of Freedom

By a Saharawi who loves Sahara

 

BIG NEWS! 300 hundred Moroccan prisoners of war returned safely to their homeland Morocco after being released by the Front Polisario! Well, it surely made the headlines. It is surely a big news and have a huge impact on the peace process between the Polisario and Morocco.Kofi Annan stated that the U.N gladly welcomed the iniatiative.The European Community declared the this is a great humanitarian action and that further actions should be taken .Both the U.N and the E.U .demand that the Polisario Front should release the remaining 600 POW's.

ALTERNATIVE BIG NEWS! There are still some sahrawi activists in Moroccan prisons, and there are many Sahrawus whose fate is still unknown. Did the U.N. and the E.U. try any efforts to investigate this, and did they pressure Morocco into unveiling the truth and putting an end to these atrocities committed against Sahrawis in their own homeland?

I agree that releasing these 300 POW's is a good thing and I agree that no matter what condition they live in, they had never enjoyed the taste of freedom as they are supposed to like any other human being as they were held in a war and did not have that much to enjoy as they would if they were in their own homeland with their own kinship. What was missing was: FREEDOM. Freedom is exactly what PWO's and Sahrawis in the occupied territory and in the liberated territory have been missing since the brutal bloody colonization of Western Sahara by Morocco. POW's were not free and have lived in a miserable situation. But let us not forget that Sahrawis in the occupied territory have been living under oppression, lack of freedom, deprivation and under brutal and arbitrary imprisonment. They were also separated from their own folks and have lost all contact with the exterior world. So they were just treated like POW's in their own homeland.

Let us not forget that the rest of Sahrawis who lived in the refugee camps and in the liberated territories have been also living in miserable conditions as they endured all the hardships od isolation from their own homeland. They also suffered from all kinds of diseases and illnesses and natural disasters that is very common in the Sahara. Their life is not comfortable at all. They long to their homeland and have sacrificed everything and paid a high price just to have freedom and get their own land back.

The sahrawis and POW's lived and still live the same situation; and ironically, POW's got back to their homeland and are ready to enjoy their lost freedom ;but how about the Sahrawis? Are they to be forgotten and ignored?

Remember Western Sahara and the Sahrawis!

25.11.03


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