RABAT: Kenya said on Monday it supports Morocco’s plan to give the disputed region of Western Sahara autonomy under the North African kingdom’s sovereignty, joining a growing number of African, Arab and Western countries that have tilted toward backing Rabat in the five-decade conflict.
The long-frozen conflict, dating back to 1975, pits Morocco, which considers the territory as its own, against the Algeria-backed Polisario front, which seeks an independent state in the desert territory.
In a joint statement issued after talks between the two countries’ foreign ministers in Rabat, Kenya said it views the Moroccan plan as the only credible and realistic solution and the sole sustainable approach.
Kenya, after 60 years of bilateral diplomatic ties with Morocco, also opened an embassy in Rabat on Monday.
Morocco, a leading phosphates and fertilizer producer, has agreed to immediately accelerate exports of soil nutrients to Kenya, as the two countries plan to cooperate on renewable energies, tourism, fisheries, security and cultural and religious affairs, the joint statement said.
Morocco’s foreign minister Nasser Bourita told reporters that Kenya’s position on Western Sahara, which he called “the national cause,” helped add a new impetus to bilateral relations.
Kenya is looking to export more tea, coffee and fresh produce to Morocco to balance its trade, Kenyan foreign minister Musalia Mudavadi said on his X account.
Kenya also backed a Moroccan initiative offering landlocked Sahel states access to global trade through Morocco’s Atlantic ports, the joint statement said.
Kenya backs Morocco’s autonomy plan for Western Sahara, joint statement says
https://arab.news/pdm5b
Kenya backs Morocco’s autonomy plan for Western Sahara, joint statement says
UN envoy hopeful on Cyprus, says multi-party summit premature
- Holguin said she was hopeful after meeting with Greek Cypriot leader Nikos Christodoulides and Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman
- “While encouraging, the dialogue process between both leaders is at its early beginning”
NICOSIA: The key UN envoy seeking to break a deadlock in Cyprus’s long-running division said she was cautiously optimistic about a breakthrough but that it would be premature to convene a multi-nation summit on the conflict.
In an interview with Cyprus’s Phileleftheros daily, envoy Maria Angela Holguin said she was hopeful after meeting with Greek Cypriot leader Nikos Christodoulides and Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman on December 11. She said their discussion, which agreed to focus also on confidence-building, was “deep, sincere and very straightforward.”
“While encouraging, the dialogue process between both leaders is at its early beginning. More will need to be done in order to strengthen the nascent momentum and establish a real climate of trust that would allow the Secretary-General to convene a 5+1 informal meeting,” said Holguin, a former Colombian foreign minister.
A 5+1 meeting would be an informal summit of the two Cypriot communities with United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and representatives of Britain, Turkiye and Greece to define how to move forward and break a seven-year stalemate in peace talks. The three NATO nations are guarantor powers of Cyprus under a treaty which granted the island independence from Britain in 1960.
A power-sharing administration of Cypriot Greeks and Turks crumbled in 1963. Turkiye invaded the north of the island in 1974 after a brief coup engineered by the military then ruling Greece. The island has been split on ethnic lines ever since.
Turkish Cypriots live in a breakaway state in the north, while Greek Cypriots in the south run an internationally recognized administration representing the whole island in the European Union.
