* UN changed report, Polisario blames France/Morocco
* France denies pressured UN over Western Sahara
By Louis Charbonneau
UNITED NATIONS, April 17 (Reuters) – South Africa’s United
Nations envoy voiced outrage on Tuesday at the watering-down of
a U.N. report on the disputed territory of Western Sahara, which
the Polisario Front independence movement says the world body
changed due to French and Moroccan pressure.
“That was very deplorable,” South African Ambassador Baso
Sangqu told reporters after a closed-door meeting of the U.N.
Security Council. “We have raised it in the council.”
Reuters has obtained all three versions of Secretary-General
Ban Ki-moon’s report on the U.N. force in Western Sahara, known
as MINURSO.
“All of it (was) progressively being neutralized,” Sangqu
said of the three revisions. “We think it’s not good for the
secretary-general. Not now, not on this issue, not in the
future. And I think most colleagues share this view.”
In his report, Ban complained that the U.N. force is “unable
to exercise fully its peacekeeping monitoring, observation and
reporting functions, or avail of the authority to reverse the
erosion” of its ability to function.
He also expressed concern about the monitoring of the force
by Moroccan authorities, which he said was hampering its ability
to function, and suggested Rabat may have been spying on the
peacekeepers.
Continued…
