Western Sahara Is Not a Bargaining Chip: Sahrawi People Calls for Self-Determination

Sahrawi and international civil society organisations are calling on the United Nations Security Council to uphold international law and complete the decolonisation of Western Sahara. Their joint letter invites organisations, movements and individuals to support the Sahrawi people’s right to freely determine their future, including independence.

Under the title “Western Sahara Cannot Be a Bargaining Chip: A Call for a Security Council Resolution Grounded in International Law,” the letter rejects political arrangements that place geopolitical interests above the rights of the Sahrawi people. Its central demand is clear: no decision about Western Sahara’s future can legitimately be made without the free and genuine expression of its people’s will.

Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of Non-Self-Governing Territories since 1963. Its unfinished decolonisation remains a question of justice and a test of the international community’s commitment to the rights of colonised peoples.

The letter recalls the legal foundations of the Sahrawi struggle. In its 1975 Advisory Opinion, the International Court of Justice found no ties of territorial sovereignty between Western Sahara and Morocco or the Mauritanian entity that could affect the application of self-determination. In 1991, Security Council Resolution 690 established the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara, MINURSO, as part of a settlement process providing for a referendum on self-determination.

The signatories insist that this commitment cannot be abandoned, postponed indefinitely or replaced by negotiations that exclude a genuine choice, including independence. They warn that subordinating self-determination to bargains between states would perpetuate injustice and undermine the principles on which the United Nations was founded.

Beyond the referendum, the letter calls for a clear, binding and time-bound Security Council resolution that protects Sahrawi civilians, human rights defenders, journalists and political prisoners. It also demands access for UN human rights mechanisms to the occupied territory, accountability for violations, protection of the Sahrawi people’s rights over their natural resources, and conditions for the voluntary, safe and dignified return of refugees once decolonisation is completed.

For feminist movements, this call speaks directly to our struggles against colonialism, militarisation and the appropriation of peoples’ lands and resources. International solidarity means amplifying Sahrawi voices and defending their right to shape their own future.

We invite National Coordinating Bodies, allied organisations, feminist movements and individuals to read, sign and circulate the joint letter. Broadening its reach is a concrete act of solidarity with the Sahrawi people and their struggle for freedom, dignity and self-determination.

Sign the joint letter here.

Western Sahara is not a bargaining chip. Self-determination is not optional. Decolonisation must be completed.