Government asks UN to shut military office in Western Sahara

March 22, 2016 6:19 AM

Dozens of U.N. international staffers pulled out of the Western Sahara mission, known as MINURSO, on Sunday after Morocco demanded they leave because U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon used the term "occupation" during a recent visit to the region.

A United Nations logo is seen on a glass door in the Assembly Building at the United Nations headquarters in New York City September 18, 2015. REUTERS/Mike Segar

Morocco has asked the United Nations to close a military liaison office in the disputed territory of Western Sahara as a spat between Rabat and the U.N. chief over his recent remarks escalates, a U.N. spokesman said on Monday.

Dozens of U.N. international staffers pulled out of the Western Sahara mission, known as MINURSO, on Sunday after Morocco demanded they leave because U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon used the term "occupation" during a recent visit to the region.

"MINURSO has ... received a request to close its military liaison office in Dakhla in the coming days, which would be the first request directly targeting the military component," U.N. spokesman Farhan Haq told reporters.

"There is no reason, none, for this escalation," he said.

MINURSO's mandate comes from the Security Council.

"We cannot allow the principle to be upheld that member states can arbitrarily go against their status of mission agreements and their commitments under the U.N. charter ... to abide by Security Council resolutions," Haq said.

Without a properly functioning peacekeeping mission, Haq said, there was a risk of a resumption of conflict.

Ban planned to raise Western Sahara with Security Council members on Monday, Haq said.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric chided the council on Friday for not taking a strong stand in the dispute.

The controversy over Ban's comments is Morocco's worst dispute with the U.N. since 1991, when the U.N. brokered a ceasefire to end a war over the Western Sahara and established the mission.

Morocco had demanded last week that 81 U.N. international civilian staff and three African Union staff leave the mission.

Haq said 73 of the U.N. personnel were temporarily reassigned. He noted that 11 individuals that MINURSO ordered out of the mission no longer worked there.

Morocco had initially given the mission three days to withdraw the specified personnel but later extended that to "within the coming days."

Rabat accused Ban earlier this month of no longer being neutral in the Western Sahara dispute when he used the word "occupation" to describe its annexation of the region in 1975, when Morocco took over from colonial power Spain.

Ban had visited refugee camps in southern Algeria for the Sahrawi people, who say Western Sahara belongs to them. They fought a war against Morocco until the 1991 ceasefire.

The Polisario Front wants a referendum on independence, but Morocco says it will only grant autonomy.

Before the reductions, the mission had nearly 500 military and civilian personnel.