Talk:Human rights in Western Sahara

Copy edited from Sahrawi

I think the article is better now, anyway its better than this. Though I have some problems with Endnote so if anyone can help? Cheers. Daryou 19:31, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Footnotes

The format is as follows:

In the article: use {{ref|<unique identifier>}}

In the footnotes section: use {{note|<unique identifier>}}

e.g.

In the article: {{ref|bbc2005a}}

In the footnotes section:

1. {{note|bbc2005a}} [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/4537870.stm BBC - Morocco abuse report criticised]

My personal preference is to keep the unique identifier as author date (like the harvard system), with a-z if there is a name that is published in the same year. Hope this helps :) - FrancisTyers 21:38, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Also, there is a tendency for notes to get out of order (e.g. note 10 in the article won't take you to note 10 in the footnotes) so periodically they should be re-ordered. - FrancisTyers 21:40, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Thank you very much. Daryou 22:34, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Western Sahara

I've moved this text from that article to this Talk page, it should be merged with this article. As parts are merged, they should be removed from this page. - FrancisTyers 12:53, 28 January 2006 (UTC)

I think this version is generally better sourced, and more extensive, and could replace the other one. Am I wrong? Arre 02:31, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

The text

In Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara

Sahrawis' human rights are severely repressed in the Moroccan-controlled territories of Western Sahara, according to human rights reports [1] [2]. The situation has improved since the early 1990s, but the liberalization which then transformed Moroccan political life, has generally not reached Western Sahara to the same extent[3], and Moroccan-held Western Sahara is generally seen as more politically repressed than Morocco. There are numerous allegations of police abuse and torture, unfair trials, restrictions on freedom of expression including an absolute ban on all advocay of independence. Foreign journalists and visiting missions have been prevented from visiting the territory and in some instances deported from it [4]. Sahrawis also complain of systematic discrimination in favor of Moroccan settlers.[5]

The response of the Moroccan army and police to the independence demonstrations of 2005 provoked international censure[6]. In a criticised mass trial in December 2005, 14 leading Sahrawi activists were sentenced to prison sentences; many more had previously been detained. [7][8]

• The "Disappeared"

Around 450 Sahrawi civilians remain politically "disappeared" by the Moroccan government, according to human rights groups. Some estimate that the total number of "disappeared" could be as high as 1,500[9]. Morocco contends that there are no cases of disappearance unaccounted for, and that the total number was always much lower. Amnesty International stated in a 1999 report that

The men, women and even children who "disappeared" in Western Sahara came from all walks of life. Many were detained because of their alleged pro-independence activities, support for the Polisario Front, and opposition to Morocco's control of the Western Sahara. Others, including elderly people and children, "disappeared" because of their family links with known or suspected opponents to Moroccan government policy in Western Sahara.[10]

Mass graves containing bodies of "disappeared" Sahrawis were found in Morocco in 2005.[11]

In the Refugee Camps

Morocco alleges that the Sahrawi refugee camps in Tindouf, Algeria, are in fact a form of concentration camps, where human rights are systematically violated. This view has gained very little support internationally, and human rights groups and foreign aid organizations that frequently visit the camps, or are permanently based there, disparage these claims[12][13][14]. The camps are sometimes instead presented as a model for running refugee camps democratically - generally by people sympathetic to the Sahrawis[15], but also by other observers[16]. However, freedom of expression, association and movement are allegedly restricted in the Tindouf refugee camps [17]. Still, the main concern of most human rights organizations seems to be the refugees' problems of basic subsistence, living on a meager diet of foreign aid. For example, Human Rights Watch carried out an extensive research mission in the region in 1995, visiting Morocco, Western Sahara and the Tindouf refugees. As for the human rights of Sahrawi refugees, HRW concluded that "we found conditions to be satisfactory, taking into account the difficulties posed by the climate and desolate location".

• Prisoners of War

There were however credible reports that Polisario forces had abused, and in some cases killed, Moroccan prisoners of war, mainly during the 1980s[18]. The Red Cross were allowed to regularly visit the POWs from 1984 onwards. Some Moroccan prisoners of war were held captive until 2005, despite demands from the UN that they should be released[19]. Polisario argued that the state of war had not been terminated, and that the POWs were still enemy combatants, but eventually agreed to release them on humanitarian grounds. Polisario still demands the release of about 150 prisoners of war allegedly held by Morocco since the end of active hostilities in 1991, but Morocco denies that it holds any Sahrawi POWs.

Tottally disputed

Francis, will you explain me your complaints about my last version? Daryou 23:21, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Francis, I just removed redundant and irrelevant information. There is a real need to reword and source many sentences. The article in its actual version is totally POV. HR organisations don't have the monopoly of the truth and the lastest reports of AI say that the situation is more and more better since the 1990's; this have to be showen in the article. Copy editing the whole HRW report doesn't help: WP isn't HRW.wikipedia.com. Thanks. Daryou 23:49, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

===>How so? And what exactly is the POV from which it is written? If HR organisations are not to be taken into account on a "human rights in X" article, who should? Do you have any better sources? The situation before the '90's was terrible, so it couldn't get much worse. If you have some credible sources for saying that it got better, add them. The simple fact that things have gotten better does not justify deleting established information. -Justin (koavf), talk 00:39, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, what's the issue here? Couldn't you mention a specific complaint, Daryou, and we could see what to do about that? And of course human rights reports have to be the primary source of information for an article on human rights...? - Arre 02:06, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia doesn't report the truth (see WP:V) One of the keys to writing good encyclopedia articles is to understand that they should refer only to facts, assertions, theories, ideas, claims, opinions, and arguments that have already been published by a reputable publisher, Wikipedia reports what notable people say about things. I'm slightly confused about who you would expect to see reported in an article on Human rights other than Human rights groups. Of course there is room for a well sourced section on Moroccan denials or refutations of the claims reported by AI and HRW, and of course feel free to add more well sourced information regarding Human rights in the Polisario controlled camps. I just read through your edit again and really you hardly made any changes, just chopped and changed things in a way that looked like major changes, I've restored the fact tags, I suggest you outline your specific concerns on the talk page before making such contentious edits in future. If you could explain your specific complaints here hopefully we can get on with the article. - FrancisTyers 05:29, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Update

I've removed the tag as there were no complaints here. - FrancisTyers 18:28, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Status of Homosexuals in Moroccan controlled areas and in the camps

Would be interesting information to have. - FrancisTyers 05:57, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Hm, good point. We should also have a womens' rights chapter, and other non-conflict related parts of HR. Here's a big page on Moroccan homosexuality, and of course the same legal system would apply in WS. There's no similar page on the camps, but I strongly doubt it's allowed there either, and I'm sure it's not socially accepted; it's pretty conservative and religious overall. Arre 06:34, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree. The concept of "human rights" relates to a lot of things and this page should give details on all the areas for both the Polisario and the Moroccan controlled areas. I imagine that in some areas there would not be a lot of difference, especially if both are conservative Muslim societies. Currently the page has a skew against the Moroccan side, which I can appreciate might be warranted, however part of this probably results from focussing on only a limited area of human rights. A more balanced page would result from dealing with all the aspects.

On an even more positive note, I'm really pleased to see such a well sourced page! Lets hope we can keep it that way. :) - FrancisTyers 09:43, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Removed pending citation

I removed the only remaining part of uncited text:

In addition, there are gender-based restrictions , and female illiteracy is high , unlike in the refugee camps.

After having found sources please feel free to readd it. - FrancisTyers 18:27, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Section put in comments

===>See Talk:Western Sahara It was decided there that the article would only be about the region of Western Sahara, and consequently the article "Human rights in Western Sahara" should only discuss human rights in this territory. You may want to move this to Human rights in Algeria. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 18:50, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

• Sorry, we are talking about Western Sahara and crimes done by Polisario are absolutely right here.
• Algeria plays a central role in the conflict about WS and was - as you see - a main actor in these crimes. This should be mentionned and underleined in all topics related to WS. wikima 08:26, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

===>I don't think you are sorry The name of the article is "Human rights in Western Sahara." If human rights abuses occur in places other than Western Sahara, they belong in articles other than this. I'm not about to go through the ridiculous voting process again just because you ignore the consensus acheieved on other articles. If you want to make reference to this, and then direct readers to related articles such as Human rights in Morocco and Human rights in Algeria, go ahead. Also, Morocco plays a central role in the conflict about WS and was - as you see - a main actor in these crimes. This should be mentionned and underlined [sic] in all topics related to WS. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 16:47, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Adequate use of sources please!

• This source does not express and international condemnation of Morocco on "use of napalm"
• It does not provide any evidence on this neither.
• This source clearly states "There were no new cases of confirmed disappearance for the fifth consecutive year". It bases futher allegations on AMDH who is a Moroccan organisation.
• Most of the unveiling of the abuses against human rights commited during the last decades is done by Morocco and Moroccan NGOs (AMDH) or institutions (CCDH, IER) on own intitiative.
• This means you must adequately by:

1/ Mentionning the Moroccan source to use this infromation.

2/ SHowing theefforts done by the country and its NGOs/institutions or at least avoiding to hide them.

wikima 10:26, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

• I removed the ranking of Freedom House as misused.
• WS is ranked like China, Cuba, Vietnam and many other countries.
• Situation in WS is not the worst in the world.
• People in WS enjoy more political stability, freedom and peaceful live than in any other parts of Africa and/or the Arab World, including Algeria the godfather of polisario, Keyna and South africa, and in most parts of the world.
• If you want to see what is the "worst", just see what Americans and British are doing in Irak.
• Freedom House is only ONE source. If you want to use that heavy anti-moroccan ranking then you need more sources and evidence to confirm.
• Again please refrain from misues of sources!!

wikima 10:56, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Please refrain from removing sourced information if something does not suit your point of view.

By late 1975, thousands of people had fled annexed territories to camps in the east of the region. After the camps had been bombarded with napalm, people moved further to south-west Algeria, near the oasis town of Tindouf.

Le Sahara Occidental, ancienne colonie Espagnole, a été annexé par le Maroc et la Mauritanie dans les années 1975-76. Il s'en est suivi une fuite de la population, d'abord vers des camps à l'est du pays, puis vers le sud-ouest de l'Algérie, après que les camps aient été bombardés au napalm.

Those are from the source. I changed "refugee columns" to "refugee camps". - FrancisTyers 12:59, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

• Please read what I write above before making wrong accusations.
• I never remove stuff because it does not point my view.

displacement of Sahrawis

• There is no source for this mis-information.
• In the article itself I am quoting the [US Committee for Refuggees and Immigrants] that states that: The Algerian government allowed (understand helped) Polisairo to confine nearly a hundred thousand of refugees [...] 'for political and military, rather than humanitarian, reasons'".
• This source appears to me to be absolutely more credibel than the 200000.
• This is now confimed by the fact that Algeria and Polisario see in the refugees their political capital in this conflict.
• This is also confirmed by the fact that both, Algeria and Polisario do not allow international orgganisation to count the refugees

=> Additional/Other evidence that 200T is wrong:

• Most intrnational institutions estimate the refugges at 155T, and this NOW. How did this number decrease from 200,000 in 1975??!
• This number is based on estimates of the Algerian governement who claims thy are 166,000. The Algerian gov. is highly interested in increasing this number.
• The UN reduced this number to 90000 in its last report.
• Algeria and Polsiario prevent any internationl institution to count the refugees.

wikima 16:44, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

=> Yet an other evidence against the 200T number:

"[...] In the Settlement Plan, both parties had agreed that the Spanish census of 1974, conducted just prior to Spain's departure from the Western Sahara, would serve as the basis for determining the pool of those eligible to participate in the referendum. The census had counted 73,497 Sahrawis." http://www.hrw.org

wikima 18:07, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Napalm

• The source does not give any evidence on use of napalm. It only mentions it.
• Many of such information circulate unverified and I strongly context this way of (mis) using sources!
• There is no information on international condemnation. This is your interpertation and The source is irrelevant in this point.

Worst situation / Ranking of Freedom House

• The source is misused. The FS lists many other countries as "worse".
• The text in the article suggests only in WS the situation is that worse.
• This is contredicted by facts. As I state above, people in WS enjoy more political stability, freedom and peaceful live than in any other parts of Africa and/or the Arab World, including Algeria the godfather of polisario, Keyna and South africa [...].

wikima 15:22, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

• Put all info re refugee camps/Tindouf in one section. The article is balanced now: One section on Morocco-controlled parts and one on Tindouf
• Added information on treatment of children etc. + Sources.

wikima 17:16, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

===>Human rights in Western Sahara
Napalm The UN source is, itself, evidence. They are a credible third party and have no vested interest in lying about Moroccan use of napalm against civilians. You may not like this, but it's not a matter of dispute.

Disappeared It is also an established fact that Morocco has taken people hostage, has prisoners of conscience in the region, and has executed extrajudicial killing in the region. I have no idea where you are getting the notion that they were done by NGOs (like who?), and you provided no evidence that this is the case. If this is true, it is still worth mentioning, because that means the government is either unable to stop it, unwilling to stop it, or both.

Freedom House You may not like the Freedom House ranking (I know I don't), but you have no right taking it out of the article. It is reputable, sourced information. You claim it was misused (how?), and instead of using it properly (how?), you just deleted it. That's vandalism:

Blanking - Removing all or significant parts of articles (sometimes replacing the removed content with profanities) is a common vandal edit.

You didn't like the assesment of Freedom House, so you deleted it. If you have some evidence that Freedom House isn't credible, then offer it. The fact that Freedom House ranks Western Sahara like China (which one?), Cuba, Viet Nam, and many other countries is not evidence that they are unreliable. The political situation in the Sahara is ranked as the worst in the world - a seven out of seven. People in the Sahara certainly do not enjoy more political stability, freedom and peaceful live than in any other part [sic] of Africa and/or the Arab World. That is patently absurd. The reference to "Irak" [sic] is polemical nonsense, and if you want to write invectives, write them somewhere else.

Number of refugees There is no accurate number of how many Sahrawis live in the camps. It is certainly more than 150,000 and less than 200,000. So, if someone writes "the better part of 200,000" or "some 165,000," there is no disputing these figures. As for credible estimates, the EU has 155,000 and the UN says 158,000. By the way, that UN report does not say that there are only 90,000 refugess. It says that they want to reduce the amount of refugees that are dependent on food from the UNHCR and WFP from 158,000 to 90,000. There are at least 158,000 refugees according to this report. Algeria and Polisario clearly do not keep people from counting the refugees, as the UN has done just that. Also, the figure of 158,000 refers to people in the camps. The other refugees include military personnel, nomads in the Free Zone, Sahrawi students travelling abroad, and SADR officials, making 165,000 a completely reasonable number. The 1974 census is the only completely reliable figure and it has little to no bearing on how many people we know for certain are in the camps 30 years later, as some of those 74,000 were displaced, and some of them weren't, and there are no reliable demographic studies on how the population has grown since then.

Freedom of movement Different NGOs and observers have had conflicting reports on the ability to move about the camps and into and out of the Free Zone. One thing that is certain, though is that "[t]he Polisario did allow some refugees to leave for education in Algeria and elsewhere and to tend livestock in the areas it controls of the Western Sahara and in Mauritania. An unknown number reportedly held Mauritanian passports and the Algerian government also issued passports to those the Polisario permitted to travel abroad." Algeria doesn't want the refugees moving over the border much because they don't want to risk another war (after Morocco instigated the Sand War and the invasion of the Sahara, that's a legitimate fear.)

The refugee camps Again, feel free to mention breifly the camps, but it belongs in human rights in Algeria, as the camps are in Algeria. Clearly, the human rights condition there is relevant to this article. So are human rights in Morocco. Neither of them should have an exaggerated presence in this article. Saying "[t]he article is balanced now: One section on Morocco-controlled parts and one on Tindouf" is completely untrue - a balanced article would be primarily about the Moroccan-controlled parts, and the Free Zone, and mention the situation in the refugee camps and Morocco.

Forced deportation I have anecdotal evidence this isn't true, and furthermore the UN has investigated these claims on two occasions and found them completely baseless. It's simply Moroccan propaganda. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 16:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• I will reply to your saying one by one.
• One Thing please: Stop accusing people of vandalims when you don't like their views.

wikima 18:21, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

OK-

• For better use I have created sections to each of topics. We can close them in this section or close the whole section.
• It would have too long if I replied here.

wikima 18:09, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

About the Dispute Banner (done by Rob)

• Where is the dispute?

1/ I deliver evidence above that the number 200T is nonsense.

2/ The rest is well sourced

• If you want to declare an article as disputed you need to justify this in a discussion not just like this, but inserting the banner.
• In this case what you want to say (need for an expert)

1/ Applies to all/most articles in Wikipedia

2/ Reflects that you have difficulties to admit information that you did not have or that does not suit your view.

• If you want to dispute the article, insert a section in the discussion and explain waht you want to dispute
• Meanwhile please refrain from labeling articles as disputed without delivering a reason. Thanks.

Cheers wikima 18:17, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Vandalism

===>Read this Here's another definition of vandalism:

Improper use of dispute tags - Dispute tags are an important way for people to show that there are problems with the article. Do not remove them unless you are sure that the dispute is settled. As a general rule, do not remove other people's dispute tags twice during a 24 hour period. Do not place dispute tags improperly, as in when there is no dispute, and the reason for placing the dispute tag is because a suggested edit has failed to meet consensus. Instead, follow WP:CON and accept that some edits will not meet consensus.

Now, either you are accusing Rob of vandalism, by improperly placing the tag, or you are yourself vandalizing the article by removing the dispute tag without any discussion. Please don't do this. Thanks. Cheers. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 19:17, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• Don't misues my pseudonym please. Thanks. wikima 19:33, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

STOP ACCUSING PEOPLE OF VANDALISM!!

• Again, STOP ACCUSING PEOPLE OF VANDALISM!
• I discuss a lot, source my edits, provide evidences
• If anyone want to banner an article as disputed he/she must deliver a reason and not just express doubts.
• I leave the tags on them because you started disputing things to which I will reply.

wikima 19:32, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

===>Internet etiquette PUTTING THINGS IN CAPS DOES NOT MAKE OTHER PEOPLE RESPECT YOU! I provided evidence for the vandalism, and you didn't dispute it. Sometimes you provide evidence, other times not. Sometimes you try to acheive consensus, other times not. Rob put the NPOV dispute tag on here becuase there was a dispute. Are you saying there wasn't one? And you started disputing things, since you were the one that changed the article after it had been virtually untouched for two and a half months. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 19:41, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• Trying to intimidate people by focusing on the rules and miusing their pseudos won't help you neither.
• When you don't have arguments you start talking about the wikpiedia rules. Also this won't help.
• I started changing things by providing evidence and making efforts. This is what wilipedia is about and you can verify.
• Rob just declared the article POV because he did not like the point of view. He did not discuss.

wikima 19:52, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

===>Intimidation? How am I intimidating you? You admitted an ignorance of one of the most important Wikipedia guidelines here, and you're a new editor. I assumed good faith by thinking that you were probably not familiar with the rules. If you are familiar with them, you are blatantly breaking them. Rob inserted the POV banner because there was a POV dispute. Look at the page history. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 19:59, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• Intimidation by misusing my pseudonym.
• Intimidation by accusation of vandalism
• If Rob wanted a POV he shoud have explained it in the discussion. This is rather how it goes

wikima 20:07, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I havn't seen the page in detail but I was under the impression that there are two competing variations and that this is a fairly obvious fact. They should both be tagged as disputed until you sort it out. --Robdurbar 21:58, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I most certainly did not add a tag as I do not like the view of the article and I find this insinuation highly offensive. I specifically said that I did not want to endorse or label any version of the article --Robdurbar 21:59, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

In fact I have tried to deal quite fairly with both Wikima and Kovaf, both of of whom clearly have strong viewpoints on this issue and both whom, I think, want to improve Wikipedia for the better but are guilty of letting your own views get in the way of this at times.

You both disagree on these articles; on some of them (Free Zone) I agree with Kovaf; over the foreign relations pages I agree with Wikima. I havn't read this one (I can't be bothered getting into another debate about Western Sahra) but I would appreciate it if we all continued to presume good faith here. --Robdurbar 22:02, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Rob,

• I did not mean to offense with any of my comments.
• I only could not understand your action as I source and deliver arguments for my edits/changes.
• Please accept my appologize for this misunderstanding.

wikima 17:38, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Apology accepted :) Remember that an NPOV tag does not necessairily mean that your (or Kovaf's) additions are wrong, just that they are currently being disputed. --Robdurbar 18:13, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Napalm

• The source does not give any evidence on use of napalm. It only mentions it.
• Many of such information circulate unverified and I strongly context this way of (mis) using sources!
• There is no information on international condemnation. This is your interpertation and The source is irrelevant in this point.

wikima 17:16, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

The UN source is, itself, evidence. They are a credible third party and have no vested interest in lying about Moroccan use of napalm against civilians. You may not like this, but it's not a matter of dispute.

-Justin (koavf), talk, mail 16:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

A:

• The report only says, fairly vagly, says "the camps had been bombarded with napalm".
• The report does not deliver any evidence on that
• The report seems to be on nutrition and not on napalm
• The report seems to have taken/translated this information from a French text, only as a secondary information, in an attempt to explain the context.
• However the French text, the real source, is itself not sourced.
• It is vague, does not deliver any evidence, so it is impossible to verify/falscify the information.
• It can well be from a pro-Algerian source.
• As mentioned above this source does not express any condemnation against Morocco. In the article it was written though:

B:

• If napalm was truley thrown then by whom? How? What were these camps exactly?
• The vagueness of the report lets the door open for other interpretations:

1/ One possibility - Napalm was thrown by Algeria: It is known that Algeria's president Boumedienne was mad to see that the Hassan II came with the idea of the Green March which was a great succes of Morocco, and that Morocco signed agreements with Spain and enterred effectively the Sahara. Boumedienne's Algeria felt he lost and he had only an old socialist/communiste reflexe left: use the people. In order to confine as many of them as possible to use later use as political capital in form of "refugees", it had to *convince* them of the danger. This way Algeria could have bombarded the assumed camps with napalm.

a/ Does the above report contredict this? I do not think so.

b/ Among the sahrawis who have stayed there are no reports, nor any tracks of napalm or such things.

2/ Mauritania was an active actor in the conflict as well. Why not Mauritania? The reports claims the camps were in the east. Who is in the east? Mauritania.

C:

• The source of all this is RNIS - Refugee Nutrition Information System which is currently called Nutrition Information in Crisis Situations. It is a report free report, a sort of bulletin of the Standing Committee on Nutrition
• I am not aware to what extent it is meant to be belonging to the UN official documents and to what exetent its articles, footnotes and second degree remarks are meant to be official statements of the UN.
• If you want/think this source must be beleave and cannot not be discussed just because the title includes "UN", then we can use the bible in Wikipedia as well.

wikima 17:43, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Some factual stuff first:

• There is plenty of evidence of napalm & white phosphorous having been used against the refugees. They have even stocked the shells and bomb cases used to deliver it, and show it to journalists at every chance they get, since it is of course good PR for them.
• All reports of this point to the same thing: the Sahrawis say they were bombed and strafed by Moroccan jets in places like Tifariti and Umm Dreiga, which forced them to move on towards Algeria. They also had plenty of burned people & bombs to show at arrival, which caused quite a stir in the press. Mauritania, in passing, hardly had an air force at the time (they got access to French Jaguars only after the front with Polisario began to crumble in 1976); and if you're trying to pin it on Algeria (allies of Polisario at the time, and not accused of this even by Morocco), then, why, it could also be Belize or Peru out on a sneak raid...

And so the point:

• It doesn't matter whether you believe it's true or not. The accusation has been made, an Internet-available source has been presented, and that's it. That's what should be said in the article. Here's a couple of more sources for your enjoyment, which should be included with whatever was deleted (see below as to why I don't want to touch the article right now): Spanish human rights group, New Internationalist Magazine Arre 19:06, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

• Your first two points are irrelevant to me. These are your statements. I have others.
• Your first source says in the title already "the absolutist-archaic Monarchy of Morocco". I don't think an opjective work. Re napalm it merely mentions it
• The second one does the same, although it refers to a confirmation of the Red Cross but without citing any source (relevant) source.
• If you have a minimum sense for scientific work and methodology (and I am sure you have) you would reject these works immmediately.
• Now we have three sources that are non relevant, including the one used as UN document.
• If you want to edit in an encyclopedia then you should avoid politics and stop following accusations that have been made by non objective articles but try to enlighten the world with objective, neutral information.
• Belize or Peru are not involved parties in the conflict. They are not the godfathers of Polisario.

Cheers wikima 21:32, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

===>Sheer hypocrisy First you reject a source that is objective and reliable, and then you reject a source since it isn't objective? For some reason, a lot of people on Wikipedia think that sources need to be NPOV; they don't. Sources simply need to be true. We've presented evidence that napalm was dropped on the Sahrawis, and you haven't refuted it except with any credible evidence, just pure hypotheticals. Even if these sources were themselves sourced, you would go to those sources and claim that they are unsourced. At some point, you have to trust the reliability of an original source. Plus, in case you weren't aware, we can use the Bible as a source. In point of fact, there are scores of articles exclusively about the Bible on Wikipedia. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 19:58, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

• Whom are accusin of hypocrisy? Are you now using personal attacks as arguments? I think I don't need to explain to you that this in not acceptable, especially that you are the one who systematically reminds the rules. So please refrain.
• As I explain above, these sources are NO evidence. They only reproduce other non sourced vague "sources".
• If we proceed this way Wikipedia becomes a bin of all kind of propaganda.
• The allegation that Morocco was internationally condemned because of the use of napalm is not sourced. Such an allegation must be ligically removed.
• We have brain to deal with sources and to make diference between evidence and talked at large allegations.

wikima 11:43, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• Do you care to explain the difference between source and evidence? What makes one thing a source and another evidence? It's apparently an arbitrary difference based on your political biases. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 18:18, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• I'll try. The article mentionning napalm was a source, as such. It was the source of an information. However this information had no evidence character as it was not based on any verifiable facts, facts, logics or information. It was just quoting an anonymous other source that sayed: Napalm was thrown on camps. No more specification. In science and research (I used to be a researcher) this kind od information is directly "put in the bin" because it is completly irrelevant. wikima 20:18, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Disappeared

• This source clearly states "There were no new cases of confirmed disappearance for the fifth consecutive year". It bases futher allegations on AMDH who is a Moroccan organisation.
• Most of the unveiling of the abuses against human rights commited during the last decades is done by Morocco and Moroccan NGOs (AMDH) or institutions (CCDH, IER) on own intitiative.
• This means you must adequately by:

1/ Mentionning the Moroccan source to use this infromation.

2/ SHowing the efforts done by the country and its NGOs/institutions or at least avoiding to hide them.

wikima 17:46, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

It is also an established fact that Morocco has taken people hostage, has prisoners of conscience in the region, and has executed extrajudicial killing in the region. I have no idea where you are getting the notion that they were done by NGOs (like who?), and you provided no evidence that this is the case. If this is true, it is still worth mentioning, because that means the government is either unable to stop it, unwilling to stop it, or both. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 16:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• Just saying "it is an established fact" is no argument.
• Many of the "established facts" turn to be fakes after investigation.
• Therefore I will not repat myself nor retype what I worte. Please read what I sayed about this point and reply to that if you want.

wikima 17:46, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

===>This is no argument, too Just re-stating what you already presented as fact without any sources or explanations (Who are AMDH? How do you know they abducted people? Was this sponsored by the government? Has the government investigated these claims? What "established facts" have been fakes?) is also not an argument. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 20:02, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

• AMDH, IER, CCDH, OMDH etc. are Moroccan organsiations / instances for human rights
• The first two have played - and play - a major role in establishing facts on violations of human rights by Morocco in Western Sahara.
• AND it's not just propaganda. Their reports are even used by polisario/algeria to attack Morocco at the UN.
• Morocco does own efforts in last years to clarify the topic of human rights in WS and ther est of its territory.
• This is what I insist is completly ommitted in this article.
• I will source and present all these impressive efforts, slowly and surely.

wikima 11:52, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• There must have been some kind of miscommunication here. I was under the impression that these organizations were behind the kidnappings. If you want to mention these sources in the article, that would be great. I'd be happy to see them there, especially since I can't understand the majority of them. Are they making some kind of claim that Morocco hasn't abducted people? What is it they are saying exactly? -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 18:22, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• Some of these organisations (e.g. IER and AMDH) did wokr on the situation in Western Sahara.
• As I said I will do some search on their findings, achievement and/or statements and reports.
• AMDH usually criticises the opression in WS by Moroccan securities and IER identified and published statements on tombs of victims in/near the Sahara.
• While AMDH is an NGO that has many of former left wings members, IER is, interestingly, a rather *royal* instance.

wikima 19:55, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Freedom House / "Worst" comparison

• I removed the ranking of Freedom House as misused.
• WS is ranked like China, Cuba, Vietnam and many other countries.
• Situation in WS is not the worst in the world.
• People in WS enjoy more political stability, freedom and peaceful live than in any other parts of Africa and/or the Arab World, including Algeria the godfather of polisario, Keyna and South africa, and in most parts of the world.
• If you want to see what is the "worst", just see what Americans and British are doing in Irak.
• Freedom House is only ONE source. If you want to use that heavy anti-moroccan ranking then you need more sources and evidence to confirm.
• Again please refrain from misues of sources!!

wikima 10:56, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

You may not like the Freedom House ranking (I know I don't), but you have no right taking it out of the article. It is reputable, sourced information. You claim it was misused (how?), and instead of using it properly (how?), you just deleted it. That's vandalism:

You didn't like the assesment of Freedom House, so you deleted it. If you have some evidence that Freedom House isn't credible, then offer it. The fact that Freedom House ranks Western Sahara like China (which one?), Cuba, Viet Nam, and many other countries is not evidence that they are unreliable. The political situation in the Sahara is ranked as the worst in the world - a seven out of seven. People in the Sahara certainly do not enjoy more political stability, freedom and peaceful live than in any other part [sic] of Africa and/or the Arab World. That is patently absurd. The reference to "Irak" [sic] is polemical nonsense, and if you want to write invectives, write them somewhere else.

-Justin (koavf), talk, mail 16:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

A:

• Try to be objective.
• I comment my changes, discuss them in the talk page, and deliver evidence and thoughts. If this is vandalism for you then you better relaxe a bit.
• I feel *Profanities" as offensive. Sure I am not English native speaker. Though I nake efforts to edit in a langugae that I don't master like a native.

B:

• The article stated intially "Freedom House ranks the political rights of the inhabitants of Western Sahara as the worst in the world "
• I checked this Freedom House source and could not find the expression "worst in the world".
• The [Freedom_in_the_World_2006 FH ranking] is related to PR - Political Rights CL - Civil Liberties and not to human rights in general.
• It does not appear to include any other aspects of Human Rights such as the question of torture, etc.
• The ranking goes from 1 to 7 whereas appears to be the worst ranking and 1 the best.
• This is all ranking for 2006 with a 7 or a 6 in it
• 21 countries have are ranked with a at least one seven (7)
• 09 countries/regions are ranked 7-7: Sudan, Cuba, Burma, North Corea, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Libya, Syria, Tibet (People's Republic of China) , thus worse than Western Sahara (Morocco)
• 12 countries/regions are ranked 7-6: Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Somalia, Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Haiti, People's Republic of China (Mainland only), Laos, Vietnam, Belarus, Saudi Arabia and Western Sahara (Morocco) are ranked 7-6, Western Sahara (Morocco) is not the worst nor the only one. Kashmir (Pakistani Administered) is ranked 7-5
• 34 countries/regions are ranked at least one time with 6: Angola, Cameroon, Chad, Congo-Brazzaville, Congo-Kinshasa, Côte d'Ivoire, Gabon, Guinea, Mauritania, Rwanda, Togo, Bhutan, Brunei, Cambodia, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Tajikistan, Algeria, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Oman, Qatar, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Kosovo (Serbia & Montenegro), Transnistria (Moldova), West Bank and Gaza (Israeli Administered)
• Morocco is ranked 5-4 partly free.

C:

• The Fredom House confirms rahter improvements and Morocco's efforts re Human Rights
• It states:

1/"On ascending the Moroccan throne in 1999, King Muhammad made some important gestures toward reconciliation, including releasing prisoners and allowing limited activity for Sahrawi human rights groups. In 2003, he formed a special commission to resolve the question of hundreds of Sahrawis who were forcibly "disappeared" during his father's reign.". 2/"A new Equity and Reconciliation Commission, created in late 2003, has begun to investigate and document disappearances and other abuses that occurred between 1956 and 1999, but it has a limited mandate and no judicial authority."

• A part from the firm reaction(s) to any independist propaganda and agitation and - in relation to this - some restriction in political activity the report also reflects that the situation is rather comparable to the rest of Morocco.

Result:

• The Freedom House source was used in a false and wrong way with regards to the rankings.
• It was used in an inadequate unilateral way.

Suggestion on use of this source (English native speaker please help!):

"In spite of imporvements since the ascendance of the Moroccan throne by Mohammed VI Freedom House expresses critics towards the situation of political rights and civil liberties in Wetsern Sahara which it ranks and fairely bad".

wikima 17:50, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

===>Huh? I don't know what you think the word "profanity" means, but I don't use them. Freedom House uses a scale of one to seven, with seven being the worst. The Sahara got a seven. They don't have to use the phrase "worst in the world" because they present rankings that list it as worst. Feel free to mention Freedom House's assesment on improving, but the source was not used in a "false and wrong way" nor an "inadequate unilateral way." -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 20:10, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

• As I say above the sources is not used adequately. Please read again what I say => The information of the Freedom House is not reflected as should be in the article. wikima 20:12, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Blanking / Vandalism

Blanking - Removing all or significant parts of articles (sometimes replacing the removed content with profanities) is a common vandal edit.

-Justin (koavf), talk, mail 16:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• In this and this change edit, you simply removed a whole section on the situation in Tindouf whic is an absolute part of the the topic.
• This you did only after my editings/addings that are well sourced.
• In the former versions you seemed to accept that Tindouf is included
• I wonder whether this presents a grave case of vandalism

wikima 17:54, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

===>Here's the difference In regards to Tindouf, I put it in comments, rather than deleting it and the section on Tindouf doesn't belong here, so it shouldn't be displayed in the article. I told you why and suggested where it should be put, rather than deleting your work. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 20:12, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Displacement of Sahrawis / Number of refugees

• There is no source for this mis-information.
• In the article itself I am quoting the [US Committee for Refuggees and Immigrants] that states that: The Algerian government allowed (understand helped) Polisairo to confine nearly a hundred thousand of refugees [...] 'for political and military, rather than humanitarian, reasons'".
• This source appears to me to be absolutely more credibel than the 200000.
• This is now confimed by the fact that Algeria and Polisario see in the refugees their political capital in this conflict.
• This is also confirmed by the fact that both, Algeria and Polisario do not allow international orgganisation to count the refugees

=> Additional/Other evidence that 200T is wrong:

• Most intrnational institutions estimate the refugges at 155T, and this NOW. How did this number decrease from 200,000 in 1975??!
• This number is based on estimates of the Algerian governement who claims thy are 166,000. The Algerian gov. is highly interested in increasing this number.
• The UN reduced this number to 90000 in its last report.
• Algeria and Polsiario prevent any internationl institution to count the refugees.

wikima 16:44, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

=> Yet an other evidence against the 200T number:

"[...] In the Settlement Plan, both parties had agreed that the Spanish census of 1974, conducted just prior to Spain's departure from the Western Sahara, would serve as the basis for determining the pool of those eligible to participate in the referendum. The census had counted 73,497 Sahrawis." http://www.hrw.org

wikima 18:07, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

There is no accurate number of how many Sahrawis live in the camps. It is certainly more than 150,000 and less than 200,000. So, if someone writes "the better part of 200,000" or "some 165,000," there is no disputing these figures. As for credible estimates, the EU has 155,000 and the UN says 158,000. By the way, that UN report does not say that there are only 90,000 refugess. It says that they want to reduce the amount of refugees that are dependent on food from the UNHCR and WFP from 158,000 to 90,000. There are at least 158,000 refugees according to this report. Algeria and Polisario clearly do not keep people from counting the refugees, as the UN has done just that. Also, the figure of 158,000 refers to people in the camps. The other refugees include military personnel, nomads in the Free Zone, Sahrawi students travelling abroad, and SADR officials, making 165,000 a completely reasonable number. The 1974 census is the only completely reliable figure and it has little to no bearing on how many people we know for certain are in the camps 30 years later, as some of those 74,000 were displaced, and some of them weren't, and there are no reliable demographic studies on how the population has grown since then. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 16:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• If polisario allowed the UNCHR to register all refugees why don't you tell us the exact number of theses instead of jumping around with numbers and estmates?
• The line in the articles about the displacement of 200T refugees had no source.
• You state that that there the number is not accurate
• Most reports you come across in the internet reflect estimates around 155T.
• The UNHCR states:

"The Algerian government estimates that 165,000 Sahrawi refugees live in four camps along the country's border with the Western Sahara"

• This is the number that you find in their statistics report (pdf)
• The USCRIestimates the WS refugees living in Algeria at 98,000.
• It further states: "We also used the working population figure of aid agencies which, in light of Polisario’s refusal to allow a census and independent estimates, was likely inflated". (ebd.)
• The USCRI further statesAs in previous years, the actual number of Sahrawi refugees remained a matter of debate. Algerian authorities, UNHCR, WFP, and refugee leaders stated that 165,000 refugees lived in the Tindouf-area camps. UNHCR was unable to conduct a census to verify the number during the year [2004]. The U.S. Committee for Refugees (USCR) has in previous years citied 80,000 Sahrawi refugees in Algeria. The new number is not a result of a new influx, rather, after further research and an extensive site visit to North Africa to examine the plight of Sahrawi refugees in July 2003, USCR is readjusting the figure to reflect the number of beneficiaries served by international humanitarian agencies.

• Thise are two comment that contredict yours on the reduction form 158T to 90T:

"Recently, UNHCR and WFP agreed that the official number of food aid beneficiaries be reduced from 158,000 to 90,000 in light of the Polisario Front's continued refusal to allow UNHCR to conduct a registration of the refugee population." http://commdocs.house.gov

"L’ONU avalise ainsi le nouveau comptage des réfugiés sahraouis effectué par ses agences humanitaires dans les camps de la région de Tindouf. Le nombre de ces derniers, qui avait manifestement été surévalué par les dirigeants du Polisario, passe ainsi de 158 000 à 90 000 individus, soit une réduction de 40 % !" Jeune Afrique

wikima 17:59, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

===>90,000 is impossible I think this is just going to come down to your lack of proficiency in English, honestly. The UNHCR report says that it is reducing the amount of people receiving a certain amount of aid to 90,000. It is not saying that the total is 90,000. In point of fact, it says precisely the opposite, since it says that there are over 150,000 refugees. I have no idea where this page got its statistics, since they contradict other UNHCR sources. Also, they mention people from Morocco, and Western Sahara is a different territory. I also don't know where Mr. Gray got his information, but he may very well have been misinformed by the same UNHCR report. I'm not going to pay to view an article in a language I can hardly understand, but I view French sources with suspicion, personally, as the French are typically pro-Moroccan. It also appears that this source is a newspaper, and I would generally find them less reputable than third-party NGO's that have visited the territory. Ultimately, I can't speak to the credibility of this source except to say that most sources have several thousand more than it apparently does. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 20:23, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

• 200,000 is impossible --> It was absolutely right to to clean Wikipedia from that wrong information.
• There were some 74,000 sahrawis in the Sahara in 1975 in total. Only a part of them were forced to go to Tindouf by polisario and Algeria (to be used in the coflict as we see now). Not more than 15-20000 must have moved there, as many of them went to Mauritania or - when lucky - to the Spain or Canaria Ilandes.
• Result: even 90,000 ca be too high.
• This number is an estimate of the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (among others)
• I am not the only one to intepret te number given by the UN as corellating with the number of refugees (as I show above if you read). So it's not a language problem.
• The 155000 number is based on numbers of the Algerian officials.
• Algeria and polisario have major intersts in keeping this number as high as possible. It's their only politival capital (read the reasons above).
• I don't think there has been an effective census and I think that Algeria and polisario don't allow a complete census to happen because the results would not serve their strategy in the conflict.

wikima 12:07, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• Where in the world are you getting 15-20,000, other than sheer conjecture? The majority of credible sources for decades have made an estimate of something like 155-165,000. If you're going to disprove them, you're going to have to provide something more substantive than guesswork based on 15,000 possible refugees thirty-two years ago. Also, you're admitting that you're totally guessing about whether or not there has been a census of the camps or why; what is the point of that? If you want to debate groundless theories, feel free to send me an e-mail or post on my talk page. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 18:27, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• Lets just forget about the 200,000 number. One can say 150-160 but not 150-200. Then why not 150-500?
• The 155 number is based on only one source: The Algerian one.
• As Algeria does not permit a census in the camps of Tindouf, international instances and NGO take the Algerian estimate to work with
• The 15,000 *guess* is not meant to base any edit but just to show you that logically there are far less than 90,000 living in the camps.

wikima 19:59, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

No Freedom of Movement in the Tindouf Camps

Different NGOs and observers have had conflicting reports on the ability to move about the camps and into and out of the Free Zone. One thing that is certain, though is that "[t]he Polisario did allow some refugees to leave for education in Algeria and elsewhere and to tend livestock in the areas it controls of the Western Sahara and in Mauritania. An unknown number reportedly held Mauritanian passports and the Algerian government also issued passports to those the Polisario permitted to travel abroad." Algeria doesn't want the refugees moving over the border much because they don't want to risk another war (after Morocco instigated the Sand War and the invasion of the Sahara, that's a legitimate fear.) -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 16:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• What you are saying is just scandalous.
• You are confirming that Algeria does not allow the refugees to move free and trying to justify this crime.
• This is a violation against the right of refugees. Holding them like cattle to milk politically is, in our times, aboslutely intolerable.
• The argument that Algeria wants to avoid the risk of a war with Morocco is complete nonsens. If it says any thing then it merely shows how deep Algeria is involved in this conflict by manipulating the refugees.
• Algeria and Polisario know very well that if they allow the refugees to move:

1/Not a single refugee would stay in the camps.

2/Almost all of them have relatives in Morocco and they wouldn't hesitate to go there, even when they chooes to live somewhere else (e.g. Spain).

4/They know well that:

a/the situation in the Moroccan governed part is far much better then in Algeria (not only in the camps)

b/Polisario and Algeria have failed to find a solution to the conflict

c/all the opression they suffer from Polisario and the Algeria securities

d/they are tired from waiting, now around 30 years,

e/even in case of independance there would never be a real indepedance for them, but they would become a micro satellite state for Algeria

f/Morocco is offering an autonomy project that would attract many of them

• =>The Polisario would be irrelevant
• =>Algeria and polisario will loose in the conflict by loosing THE central element

• This is why the refugee must stay there and this is why they are controlled
• If some of them are allowed to travel, then their case should be looked at. They are either close to the power abusing people in the Polisario direction (clientellism) or they have to give guarantees to come back, e.g. never whole families are allowed to go out.

• This is now the kind of appeals the international community is expressing: “Algeria should shut these camps down and donors should offer transportation resources to the refugees so they can relocate to more hospitable locations where they can be self-reliant while waiting for resolution of their plight.” Lavinia Limón, USCRI president and CEO; during the floodings in the camps.

wikima 18:03, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

===>No worse than Palestine Look, if you want to argue ad nauseam about the relative merits of the treatment of refugees, feel free to do so on my talk page. I personally think that the way that Palestinians are forced into Gaza by Arab leaders that don't care about them except as political pawns against Israel is far more abominable, but that's off-topic. We can argue about those things on our own time. E-mail me if you want. I'm not confirming that Algeria does or doesn't do anything; I've never been there. All I know is that I've read several sources that directly contradict one another regarding freedom of movement. Algeria didn't want a war with Morocco the first time; they just wanted independence from France. Morocco instigated the Sand War and the conflict in the Sahara, that's not a matter of dispute. This statement "Not a single refugee would stay in the camps" is totally impossible to prove and something you cannot possibly know. The only Sahrawi refugee I've ever met said he would stay in the camps (and in fact did after his education in Cuba and Libya). The situation in the Moroccan-governed part is not far much better than in Algeria according to Freedom House, and I trust them more than you when it comes to relative political freedom. Morocco has failed to find a solution to the conflict that they caused. They have consistently been belligerent, agreeing to terms of negotiation and then backing out inexplicably (see Baker II, for instance). If Algeria shut down the camps, what exactly do you think would happen to these people? I agree the camps should be shut down, but they should be shut down because Morocco stopped occupying the territory, tore down their wall, and let the people govern themselves freely. The situation exists because of Morocco. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 20:32, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

• Sorry, what are you talking about??
• There are enough indices that Polisario is forcing sahrawis to stay in the Tindouf camps. The US Committee For Refugees and Immigrants says that and it is not the only source. The camps are surrounded by Algerian securities and polisarian milices.
• No normal people will decide to live in such conditions. If they would enjoy free they would all leave, at least to Mauritania or Spain when they refuse to join thier relatives in Morocco.
• Polisario is holding them like the old stalinists used to hold people behind walls.
• This is the topic. And it must be fomulated adequately. That's all.
• Sorry that I will simply ignore what you wrote as irrelvant.

wikima 15:21, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

The Refugee Camps in Tindouf

Again, feel free to mention breifly the camps, but it belongs in human rights in Algeria, as the camps are in Algeria. Clearly, the human rights condition there is relevant to this article. So are human rights in Morocco. Neither of them should have an exaggerated presence in this article. Saying "[t]he article is balanced now: One section on Morocco-controlled parts and one on Tindouf" is completely untrue - a balanced article would be primarily about the Moroccan-controlled parts, and the Free Zone, and mention the situation in the refugee camps and Morocco. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 16:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• You are confusing Tindouf, the Algerian town with the refugee camps there
• In the conflict around Western Sahara there are officially tow parts: Morocco and Polisario with a third deeply involved: Algeria. Many observers close to the question see the conflict as mainly between Morocco and Algeria, but this is an other discussion
• Ergo, you cannot talk about the Human Rights only of one actor, but must describe the whole picture
• Polisario is based in Tindouf, the refugees are also in Tindouf. It's there where it committed the grave crimes together with Algeria and continues to violate the human rights with support of Algeria.
• Ergo, the so called "free zone" is irrelevant here.
• Hoever if I come across any information on crimes committed by Polisario elements in the area behind the sand wall, I will not hesitate to add it.

wikima 18:05, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

===>See Human rights in Algeria If you don't mind, stop telling me what I'm doing. I'm not confusing the camps with the town; both are in Algeria and consequently belong in the "Human rights in Algeria" article. I don't know how I can make this more clear. If it happens in Algeria, it goes in that article. Of course it's relevant; therefore, you mention it, and direct the reader to the appropriate article that is about that topic. That's why there are hyperlinks on the Internet. The only reason why people would think that they two parties in the conflict are Morocco and Algeria is because Hassan II refused to negotiate directly with Polisario for years, and only discussed the conflict with Algeria on a state-to-state basis. I have no idea why you think the Free Zone is irrelevant; it is actually in Western Sahara. For some odd reason, you want to discuss human rights violations outside of Western Sahara, and not discuss the situation in an actual part of the territory. What are you talking about? -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 20:47, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

• Western Sahara is not just a geography but a topic in first instance. We are talinkg about human rights in Western Sahara but in the sense of "related to Western Sahara".

• If you want to stuck to the geographic criteria no problem. We must then do the same for all. Every thing located in Tindouf (polisario, the so called sadr etc.) will be discussed as part of Algeria in the Algerian page.

• The free zone thing is being discussed at its page. There is nothing for the moment. If there are issues related to human rights (probably commited by polisario) then, yes we should add.

• In both cases Algeria is a part of the conflict and must be mentionned. Evidence and sources as well of course.

Cheers wikima 15:13, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

===>Western Sahara is Western Sahara

• I have no idea what this means "Western Sahara is not just a geography but a topic in first instance." Allow me to quote from dictionary.com (emphasis added):

A region of northwest Africa on the Atlantic coast. ... Mauritania renounced all claims in 1979, with Morocco occupying its portion, but guerrilla resistance from the nationalist Polisario Front forced the Moroccans in 1991 to agree to a UN-monitored referendum on the region's status. Source: The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

An area in northwestern Africa with rich phosphate deposits... Source: WordNet ® 2.0, © 2003 Princeton University

Western Sahara is a region. If human rights abuses happen outside the region, they don't belong in this article. I have no idea how this could be more clear. If you want to mention human rights abuses in Algeria, Mauritania, and Morocco, please do, as they are relevant, but not the topic of the article. (Hence, you shouldn't flood it with information that's off-topic.)

• Whether or not I want to stick with the geographic criterion is irrelevant; Western Sahara is a region in Africa, regardless of your opinion of it. Polisario and the SADR are located in both the Free Zone and Algeria, so if you're trying to imply that all references to either entity belong in Algerian articles, or they are merely Algerian plots against the Moroccan state, you've got to realize that I'm not going to fall for that. There is no way that I'm going to agree to something outlandish like that.
• As far as I'm aware, there aren't any human rights abuses in the Free Zone, so I don't know what could or would be written. If you have some sources that describe the human rights situtaion there, I'd be delighted to read them. My guess is that human rights are generally respected there, as most of the inhabitants are nomads who are likely left to their own devices.
• Sure, Algeria should be mentioned, not the bulk of the article. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 03:08, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• You don not need to explain to me what a region is and that WS is one region.
• Again, all topics such as Polisario, "SADR", the Sahraouis in the refugee camps and all related stuff, are located in Tindouf in Algeria. Further to your logic we should treat them as part of Algeria, in the Algerian page(s).
• If we proceed this way we will need to absolve Western Sahara from all these entities and leave it only and mainly treated in the Moroccan pages. Yeah this would make sense as Morocco governs the region really, effectively and totally.
• The "free zone" is only pro-polisario propaganda fiction and naming. It has no recongintion. The presence of Polisario and "sadr" in that empty corner is extremly limited and conditionned and it causes polisario rather condemnation by the UNO. So we can mention very briefly and accordingly and link to the algerian pages for polisario, "sadr" and all the rrealted stuff that is located in Tindouf and Algier.
• This is very simple and clear and it is up to you to choose the logic you want to adopte and I spare the effort of explaining what I mean by topic versus region.

wikima 11:32, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• I think I do need to explain it, as you're disputing it.
• This is the last time that I'm going to write this, so please pay attention: The SADR is present in Western Sahara. It is not true that all stuff related to the SADR and Polisario should be relegated to Algeria-related articles.
• If you keep on writing things like "The 'free zone' is only pro-polisario propaganda fiction and naming" without offering evidence and stating it as though it's fact, it's going to be pretty hard to take anything you say seriously. Third parties have been there, such as MINURSO; it's real. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 18:09, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• If you suggest something you have to accpet the logic behind.
• "sadr" and polisario are located in Tindouf not in the so called "free zone".
• Their incursions in this region, which are partly internationally condemned, can not be seen as a fact that they are based their.
• Therefore they should be treated in the Algerian page as Tindouf is in Algeria.
• This is not my, but your logic. So you have to accept it, then we can make the change, in this AND in all the other articles, and start moving every thing based in Tindouf to Algeria, including polisario, "sadr" and all their related articles.
• If you do not accept this, then you have to drop the narrow focusing on the geogrpahic limits and start admitting that the crimes committed by polisario are done in relation to Western Sahara and therefore can be extended in this article.

=>This does not exclude though the central role of Algeria in these crimes and in the conflict in general

• I do strongly dispute the "free zone" thing in the talk page of the so called free zone. It is indeed no official nor recognized term, but a propaganda of Polisario and pro-polisario activits.

wikima 20:10, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

What just happened to this article?

I'm sorry, I'm not really up to date here. The article (which was, btw, recently the subject of long meditation) has been given a complete overhaul, and an obviously slanted one at that. Is this the version that is presently being edited, or is there a question of reverting to another one? Or is there an ongoing revert war? Doesn't seem like it, so I'm confused. I'm not opposed to editing the new stuff in, but there are also many changes I don't agree with (incl. deletions). My concerns:

• Things that were previously here, and were sourced, are missing. Like the napalm thing, which was sourced, but has apparently been deleted because Wikima doesn't like it. See my comment above too.
• Many of the things added (I suppose) by Wikima are hugely over-detailed, to blow them up in size. To counter that, we could of course do the same to the accusations of Moroccan human rights violations (listing torture methods, some 500+ disappeared, etc), but that would just make the article unwieldy. I prefer if we could summarize all accusations more briefly and instead include links to whatever reports or statements this is about.
• Many of these things are also presented as one-side only, for example in the case of "deportations" to Cuba. The UNHCR, which oversees the Sahrawi students' programme in Cuba, has twice[21][22] refuted the accusations that it is somehow involved in a people-trafficking operation with Polisario and Cuba, through public investigations. This obviously merits mention, and neglecting to refer to it I think is strongly POV.
• Question: I don't think a newspaper editorial merits being quoted as a source, if it doesn't present independent/new facts, but just rehashes a political argument. And I also thought there was some kind of WP regulation against this? But if not, I have a few clippings of my own to suggest.
• Plea: PLEASE stop making political arguments on this talk page, it's hard enough to get a grasp on what's going on if you can't log in daily, without swamping it in petty political fights. NOTHING should be discussed on here except what sources and direct changes are acceptable, and what sources are not.

Thanks. And I repeat my main question: what version of this page should I attempt to edit, or are we still stuck in reverting back and forth? Arre 19:32, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Arre,

• There is a whole discussion going on - Please see above.
• I don't think it makes sense to edit further.
• Make your suggestions in this talk pagé, then we can work together to improve.
• When things are one-sided anti-Moroccan there is little concern about it. Example: The whole topic Western Sahara is mis-used for "sadr" and polisario and none complains. If I remember well, It took a huge efort just ot clarify that WS is a terriory and to remove the "sadr" flag from its tempaltes.
• The case of the Moroccan POWs shows how blind international organisations are in this topic. 15 years after the ceasefire prisonners were buerned alive, forced to work force, tortured, murdered, beaten to death, held in little metal boxes for months, physically mutiliated etc., and where was the UNCHR and all the beatiful world who travelled to Tindouf??! It is a shame for the humanity!
• I admitt that I am not native speaker, however I insist on things that I add and - balanced accurate - content has priority. Wha I need is help with the language and style. So you welcome to help

wikima 19:50, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

• I can't make much sense of the discussion. I believe the things that have been deleted should be restored, because I certainly don't agree with their removal. Count that as a suggestion.
• Moroccan POW:s & selective outrage - yeah, yeah, shame on everyone. But this is politics, and let's stick to editing.
• Your language is not a problem, and I haven't said that it is (and I'm not a native speaker either). Spelling errors are easily corrected. But the bias you introduce into the article through deleting information without consensus and adding disproportionate amounts of text mass (and repetitions of the same) on things that conform to your POV, is a problem, in my view. But we could probably sort something out - I'm all in favour of an inclusive approach, and all sourced edits have a place on the page, but it also needs some balance. Plus of those facts presently left out or deleted.

Arre 20:11, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

• Dicussion is discussion and discussions are *main* part in wikipedia
• When a line says that 200T of people have been displaced, without delivering any source, while the average number reports talk of is 150T, then this line can be deleted when evidence is delivered.
• If you are against this, then I suggest to keep the line but with 35000 as number, without source. Turn your fairness button on and you will understand.
• Moroccan POWs: Yes, it is a shame that activists, observers internaitonal instances, international NGOs, international jounralists etc. visit Tindouf whithout being able to denounce abominable crimes commited by Polisario and Algeria. All were saying all is fine over there as they continue to do.
• Relevance of this: In the same manner, editors have been dealing extensively with the topic of human rights in this article without being able to mention one of the main crimes commited by two involved parties in the conflict: Algeria and Polisario. This is the biase, a scandalous one.
• This is politics as you rightly say. I am conscious that the editing in an encyclopedia is something else but still, we are dealing with a political topic and one the complicated political conflicts in the world and not with on butterflies int this article.
• I made efforts to deliver information with sources and evidence. You see the problem because this does not confort your view. And that's rather the problem.
• I will have an other a look and try to re-edit and to consolidate some of the stuuf I inserted.

Cheers wikima 21:29, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

• 200,000: I haven't even followed your debate over numbers of refugees. Maybe I could if you didn't try to change the whole page at once.
• POWs: It is not true that this has not been mentioned on Wikipedia. I have written on alleged Polisario abuse of POWs myself.
• Politics: Yes, this is a political subject. But if you want to debate the politics apart from what is being edited, and express your personal outrage at this-and-that, you have my e-mail. Leave it out of the talk page.
• I haven't complained about your sources. Well, I asked a question on WP policy on editorials as sources, but that's it. I think all sources, biased or not, are fine as examples of allegations -- we're not after the facts, just what people say are the facts. I complained mainly about unwarranted deletions and giving undue prominence to politically selected material (several para's on alleged torture of Moroccan POWs in the 1980s, much less on Amnesty's present-day torture allegations against the other side).

Btw, I'm still not clear on whether this is the version I should be editing. Someone tell me, or I'll get to it.Arre 00:19, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

• The 200t number was an example: Everyone knows that it is wrong and an exageration. It stayed there for long time, without a source and without anyone of you complaining. You complain now that I cleaned the article from this.
• The POWs is an other example: a whole article is written on human rights in WS without mentionning the worst violations, war crimes and crimes against humanity, that are well sourced, and especially reported in a detailled manner by France Libertes.
• Presenting the POWs topic among "allegations" that are comparable anyhow to those against Morocco is abolsutely not acceptable.

1/ The practices against these POWs are now facts and not allegations

2/ They are comparable rather to ware crimes and crimes against humanity

3/ International organisations regularely expressed their worries about them but did nothing more

4/ It is a shame, indeed, that activists who mean to fight for human rights go on romantic trips to Tindouf, write affective stories about the desert but without being able to be aware of the worst crimes happenning in the Tindouf camps, although the information was availble.

5/ Only France Liberte was tough to establish a what one would call a detailled report. No wonder that it stopped immediately all support to this organisation.

6/ As long you will try to diminish these crimes, I will balance by giving more details and insisting on their special non comparable character.

• The discussion is now structured: There is a section for each topic. Try to read through. This is better then discussing eight or nine topics, all in long texts and in the same time.
• Editing now, while we still have the "burble", I don't think this is wise.
• Be patient, make your suggestions, tell us what you want to edit and how you want to do, and hopefully we can make steps towards more clarification.

Cheers wikima 11:18, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

• A) As I told you, I have not followed the debate on numbers. Stop accusing me of being on the wrong side of it, I'm not even a participant. (If you keep pushing me, I'll be forced to read up on it, and then chances are I'll end up opposing you. So behave.)
• B) The charges of torture of POW:s will not be presented as facts, since they are disputed. Similarly, Morocco's bombardment of Sahrawi refugees with napalm, will not be presented as a fact. Wikipedia is not to decide who's right and who's wrong. Both of these things, and all other, shall be presented as coming from the sources we use -- for example, we will write that the France Libertes foundation accuses Polisario of having tortured POW:s and forced them to work[23], and we will write that Amnesty International accuses Morocco of having abducted and killed hundreds of civilian Sahrawis[24]. In neither case will we write that this is true or false, because that's not up to us to decide.
• C) Your threat, or whatever it is, that you will pour more detail in on accusations against the Polisario and "insist on their non comparable character" (??!), is an example of a really bad attitude to editing Wikipedia. Both because it is not an acceptable style of debate to threaten to shipwreck the process if you don't get what you want, and because there is of course nothing "non coomparable" about alleged torture by Polisario, as opposed to alleged torture by Morocco. We shouldn't even relate them to each other -- we should present both sides factually and according to the sources, no more, no less, regardless of who appears in a better light. You seem to be suggesting that a smaller number of sourced alleged Polisario crimes should intentionally be given more space, so as to balance a larger number of sourced allegations against Morocco. I find that very inappropriate, and I'm sure you understand why.
• D) I honestly don't know what a "burble" is. A quarrel? In that case I agree, but you've already changed the article a lot. Since you're the one with the changes, why not go back to the status quo ante and then explain what you want in and what you want out. Otherwise I shall be forced to revert at least parts of what you have already done, to get my deleted stuff back, and you would probably counter-revert - et cetera ad nauseam. It would be a whole lot messier than just discussing the original page and adding any new sourced material piece-by-piece, and deleting unsourced old material piece-by-piece.
• E) I agree on the method, but, as I said, I believe it would work better if you did the same. Especially since you're the one who wants a complete overhaul of the page, not me. So revert to the original status and we'll drop your stuff in paragraph by paragraph. I have no problem with most of it, I'm mainly concerned with what you have deleted.
• F) Could we please keep the lettering (A-F) so the discussion will be easier to follow?

Thanks, Arre 22:38, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

• A) Telling people "behave" is no manner to discuss. If you hav not followed the debate then it's never too late to do. If you just want to go your way as ou like then this is not the spirit of wikipedia of which the common work is one of the main principles. So I don't understand your intransigeance.

• B) There is evident on the treatement of the morrocan POWs. France Libertés presents a report, a detailed one. The organisation did not just accuse. since it was a strong supporter of polisario the report is highly credible. And there is not only the report of FL. We will add all the vevidence on these crimes. And if we have evidence then we should formulate accordingly.

Interestingly I miss such a position whenit comes ti accusations against Morocco.

If you have evidence from ai or whaterver on the killings by Morocco, then fine. But then we should include what ai says on the situation also in the last time. And alos include the work of Moroccan organisations and the developement of Human Rights issue in general under the Moroccan intitiatives. Thsi aspect is not discussed.

• C) No, you completly misunderstand. First of all it is no threat, just a reply to what you say, here, in the talk page. An then it is related to the talk page not to the edits. Two different things.

This being said, telling people that their attitude is bad allwos them to tell you the same when they feel like that. Please refrain and try to adapt your style of talking to people. Thanks

• D) I stopped changing when the dispute banner was set. It makes no sense to change as long as the divergences are big. If you change, I will change as well. I guesse this is what you commonly call an edit war.

• E) Editing does not mean only adding, it includes also changes and deletes. Saying that 200000 refugees were displayced by the conflict results in deleting such a wrong and tendancious desinformation. Now the topic is open, lets see how many refugees live indedd in Tindouf and what are the sources before adding this.

Same with other non based allegations and activitis pro-polsarian propaganda

The article should remain as is until we have some calrity. A revert is interpreted as a change. See D)

• F) As you see I do. Hope you react accordingly with the discussion in general.

Cheers wikima 14:54, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

I'll be off

I know this kind of information belong to the personal page. However I do not have one and as I am involved in all the discussion I feel the duty that I have to to inform you that I will be off for the next two-three weeks. Very probably I will not be able to access the internet.

This section can be deleted after. Thanks. wikima 20:20, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

expansion

Duly noted that you're off, WM. As you can see, I expanded the page, to restore stuff that was deleted and to add in the responses from the UNHCR etc. It is not complete (it still doesn't say anything about the biggest human rights issue, the mass flight of 1975), but we'll get around to that.

Now, important thing here is that I didn't remove any of your info. I've shoved it around and copyedited, along with Koavf's stuff, and plucked out a repetition or two, from both parts of the article, but all the torture etc allegations are still there. That's how I think editing should be done: add more, source more, don't delete sourced info: if you feel something is unwarranted or wrong, find contrary sources.

One exception: the Washington Times editorial quote, I deleted. It didn't add much to the meaning, and it is, frankly, an editorial quote. But if you dearly want it back, I'm okay with that.

I would be really disappointed if you just went along to delete all this now, because I spent a huge amount of (precious) time on it, and it really was done with the best of intentions -- adding missing material in, while preserving your edits, and recreating cohesion in the article. But I can't see why you would do that, and I don't think you will. Keep adding instead. And, if you can -- or anyone else can -- please help me get those pictures better aligned with the text.

Ciao, Arre 11:03, 9 June 2006 (UTC).

Hi,

• Thanks Arre. My absence was somewhat longer (summer) but no worry I would not just delete like this.
• Here are two first observations:
  • As photographs of vticims are strong message transponders/amplifiers, and widely used in propaganda, we should decide whether we use the here ot not. If yes, we must add those of victims of polisario (they should be available). If not, then not.
  • Paragraph Freedom House must be redone/summarised without the bullets. It does not derserve such an extension. The one on France Liberté which is much more extensive has been summarised.
• The article has evolved. I will read through and give my feedback for the rest.

Cheers - wikima 17:17, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi

* I had given my reamrks on August 13.

* Howver no reaction

* If no reaction after 24 h I will start making changes, e.g. what I rekarked above.

* Id you are interested in the artcile please react

* If not please refrain from polemical reactions afterwards.

Thanks wikima 21:08, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Can do If you want to take out photographic evidence of human rights abuses, I certainly object to that. If you want to include photographic evidence of human rights absues by the Polisario, then feel free to include it if it occured in Western Sahara. If it occured somewhere else, include it in another article. If you're thinking of neutering the section by Freedom House, I'm opposed to that. If you're thinking of including a report by another organization on the human rights situation in Western Sahara, I'm for it. Is there something else you want? -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 21:44, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

• Well, honnestly, I would be interested in the opininon of the others. Arre? Other people?
• Justin, we had discussed the matter of the geographical location. I assume it is closed and there is a whole section on the crimes commited by polisario in Tindouf. If you object, remember polisario and "sadr" is located in Tindouf and I guesse they are WS related aren't they?
• Sure I will add photogpraphs of Moroccan POWs, victims of war crimes of polsiario.
• I will also extend the information on the findings of France Liberté (adding bullts) just as done for freedom house (matter of balance and symetry). If you object do for both.
• Anyhting else?

wikima 22:04, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Wikima, nothing has changed about the scope of the article. If you want to talk about the human rights situation outside of Western Sahara, that information should primarily be elsewhere. You can link to it from here and summarize it, of course, but it doesn't belong here. If human rights abuses happened in Tindouf, they belong in human rights in Algeria. I'm concerned about the line about balance and symmetry, but by all means, feel free to mention any germane reports by any credible institutions. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 22:17, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

• There is a section already called "Human rights in the refugee camps"
• I am not intrested in discussing the geogropahy again as we closed that discussion already. Thanks.

Cheers wikima 22:31, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Huh? And how did we close it? I don't recall there being much resolution on this page. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 22:34, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

• Yes it is closed. Just see all the effort Arre did and which he presents in this very section.
• So please lets avoid turning in the same polemic again or "sabotaging" efforts. Lets be positive, lets be constructive and lets progress with this work. Thanks wikima 22:41, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

X in Western Sahara The title of the article says it all, Wikima. And don't be passive aggressive by politely asking that I don't sabotage efforts (using scare quotes); it doesn't fool anyone and it's not constructive. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 22:44, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

POV and disputed stuff

Firstly, let me state that the best way to keep an article without the POV and disputed tags is to keep it clean of bias and unfounded allegations, and writing it in good faith. Not because the people involved in discussion are on holiday, or sick, or ..., that the disputed facts become real. And No one should inject intox in the Wiki articles and then sit complaining why there are POV tags on them, nor should he/she expect people to be stretching their legs in front of the PC enjoying argument and having nothing else to do. So patience and patience.

The article has been disfigured since the Wikima has been off. So my remarks are the current version:

• introduction: What is the meaning of stating already in the beginning that strange talk about "heavily" and "less frequent". Is it better to abuse less? What is the measure of frequency less/more here?.
• Status of the parties: the Polisario position is simply mentionned. The position of Morocco is quickly followed by a "BUT". As far as I know, the Polisario in the Moroccan vocabulary is a separatist movement given the Moroccan origins of its leaders. Suspection of Terrorism and traffic of weapons to terrorist organisations operating in the Sahel and the big Sahara do exist. And again in what is supposed to be the Moroccan position, the Polisario is given the Mic to say they want a clean war.
• Almost all detainees are either set free immediately or if sentenced, are pardonned by royal decree shortly afterwards.
• Aminatou is already free and was recently touring Europe advocating independence for WS. She has not been imprisonned or harrased upon her return. That is worth a mention, instead of letting the reader think she is still jailed.
• what is the meaning of heavy-handed? Does the dispersion of rioters happen with candies?.
• The riots are almost esxlusively in one place in an area in Elaiun (Maatalla), with sporadic occurencies of youth lifting Polisario flags in some places and disappearing. I don' treally call it upprising.
• Freedom of expression: You can enter Polisario sites and see the pictures of Aminatou celebrating her release with Polisario flags, while Moroccan forces are away looking witout intervention. Salem Tamek and many others speak to the press and state they are for independence, and are not harrased for that. Lemrabet has made statements (and still frequently does) against the monarchy and the position of Morocco in the Sahara (though he affirms the Sahara is Moroccan), and he is not arrested when he is (frequently) in Morocco.
• There is no mention of the organisation of Sahrawis victims of human rights abuses in Polisario camps in Algeria.
• You made well mentionning that the internet has become a tool in the propaganda war. Morocco has every right to censor sites that are part of its adversaries tactics to promote riots.
• "the disappeard" 450 or 1500. Are there any neutral sources for those figures?? the article reffered to "Freedom House" states "Local and international human rights organizations say hundreds, if not more than 1,000, Sahrawis remain "disappeared.". What are those international organisations and what are the documents where that is stated?
• "in 2005 mass graves ...", link to the BBC article which states "The graves of 85 people, who had been detained in secret prisons, were also identified.". it refers to people that died during their long detention at distant intervals and each one in its own grave. the definition of a mass grave states "Mass graves are usually created after a large number of people die or are killed, and there is a desire to bury the corpses quickly". Now where are the mass graves? Does the injectors of this allegation understand what is a mass grave?.
• Freedom House:
• "Anti-democratic governance": is The elections in the Saharan provinces register high scores of participation. The independence mineded militants do not have the necessary support to access a seat to the parlement (How come they complain? a non-Moroccan in the Moroccan parliament? strange!!)
• Restricted freedom of expression I stated above the cases of Tamek and Aminatou that contradict this judgment.
• Freedom to assemble, including organized labor: peaceful demonstrations happen regularely in Morocco. All the trade unions are active in the sahara, and local Saharwis are very active in them. Tamek was (is?) the secretary general of one of these labor unions in the South.
• Extrajudicial killing. cases? sources?
• There is so much to say about the rest, but I stop here now, and I will come back to the rest of the article later. --SteveLo 09:50, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

===>POV tags Let me preface what I'm about to say with a few general remarks regarding the POV tags and the entire discussion process. If one puts a disputed or POV tag on a page and then refuses to discuss why the article is deficient, he's editing in bad faith. If someone says he's going to be back in a few weeks, and then disappears, no one is obliged to leave the tags on the page for eternity (what if he did die? Should it be there forever in memoriam?) This is especially the case when an editor has clearly created a pattern of complaining about POV in order to push an agenda on Wikipedia articles. The discussion process will not go on indefinitely, and if one side refuses to continue in good faith with new argumentation, then I'll go to mediation or arbitration. I'll even put it to a dreaded vote. What I won't do is talk forever while the article(s) stagnate and don't get any better, and ignorant users are under the impression that the information presented is somehow deficient, when in fact it doesn't fit the biases of one particular editor.

• I think you know what the point is: there is one side to the conflict that has been the instigator and the source of more opprobrium. In World War II, there were certainly atrocities committed by the Allies, but criticism is given to the Axis for many more far-reaching abuses. Also, I think it is generally the case that it is better to abuse less. Are you sincerely arguing that it's not?
• The "but" is there because Morocco's claim has been debunked. Can you dispute that Polisario are a national liberation movement? Has anyone credible ever said that they aren't? Feel free to insert that "Polisario in the Moroccan vocabulary is a separatist movement." It has nothing to do with "the Moroccan origins of its leaders." If this suspicion is true, provide a credible source.
• And then arrested again. And some of them are killed an thrown in mass graves. And some of them are never seen again.
• Well, this would be in the article, if it wasn't for the gridlock caused by Wikima.
• No, but there is such a thing as police brutality (or, barring that, sheer incompetence), such as running over a sixteen year-old boy. Or you could do what a democratic state does, and allow peaceful demonstrators to peacefully demonstrate.
• That's not true; there are uprisings (I have no idea why you call them riots, since the vast majority of the violence is committed by the police) in Smara, and even Moroccan universities.
• There are many that talk about Sahrawi self-determination and they are harrassed (see Ali Lmrabet for instance.) The decision to harass or not harass is largely determined by which third-party NGO's happen to be around at the time.
• Then make one. And source it. And put it in the article Human rights in Algeria.
• Or you could say that people have a right to free speech, and Morocco is obliged to provide free and fair access to information. I'm also not sure that you understand what the word "riot" means.
• Freedom House is itself a neutral source and international human rights organization. For instance, Amnesty International writes:

"For two decades Amnesty International has documented and campaigned against human rights violations in Western Sahara. Following Moroccos annexation of Western Sahara in 1975, hundreds of Sahrawi men and women were arrested and disappeared. More than 300 of these disappeared were released by the Moroccan authorities in June 1991, after up to 16 years in inhuman conditions in secret detention centres where scores of them died. To date their families have not been able to find out where their relateives are buried, and these deaths have not been recognized by the authorities. In the same year some thiry Moroccans were also released after 18 years in the the secret detention centre of Tazmamert."

Needless to say, you can find dozens of other references on their site alone.

• These people were killed and there was a desire to bury their corpses quickly.
• The people elected are occupiers who are elected by settlers. The simple act of voting also does not demand that a state be a democracy; there is voting in the People's Republic of China, are they a democracy, too? They complain because they aren't allowed to govern themselves, and yes it is weird that Morocco is administering by force a territory that is not theirs.
• The fact that there are isolated cases where people aren't arrested doesn't prove anything. If you can find cases of restriction, then freedom of expression is restricted.
• Freedom House says they aren't active, and they're a more reputable source than you are. You're not offering any evidence, you're just saying the opposite of what they say. The US State Department wrote in 2004:

"There was little organized labor activity in the Western Sahara. The same labor laws that apply in Morocco were applied in the Moroccan-controlled areas of the Western Sahara... Moroccan unions were present in the areas of Western Sahara controlled by Morocco, but were not active... There were no strikes, other job actions, or collective bargaining agreements during the year. Most union members were employees of the Moroccan Government or state-owned organizations. They were paid 85 percent more than their counterparts in Morocco as an inducement to Moroccan citizens to relocate to the Western Sahara. Workers in the Western Sahara were exempt from income and value-added taxes."

So, the majority of the workers are government employees subsidized to work there, and there is neither incentive nor possibility to collectively bargain.

• Feel free to say more, but I'd encourage you to show at least one source of your information. It would also be nice if you had something to add to the content or quality of the article. -Justin (koavf), talk, mail 14:27, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

• • Yepp SteveLo. The situation has changed dramatically in Morocco but this is not reflected in the article.
  • The role played by the Moroccan instances for human rights is not visible in the article
  • I think which should make an effort in this sense and underline this more.

Thanks for you remarks.

Cheers - wikima 17:32, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Justin refrain from reverting

• Freedom House section is chortened as we do not need to quote the whole report.
• The accusations of the organisation remain, though not of THAT weight in the world

wikima 19:49, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

FH report Nowhere near the whole report is quoted; in fact, it's less than a quarter. How is it helpful to the reader to just list that persons were extrajudiciously killed without saying who, when, where, or why? I don't understand what your second points means. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 19:24, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

• Initially I took the example of FH to present the report of Frane Libertés on the war crimes and crimes against humanity commited by polsiario
• What I am doing here is just taking the efforts of Arre for best practice and doing the same with the FH
• You don't seem to understand this because you don't follow but just revert
• YOu can expand the summary on FH but without POVs and without exceeding a certain limit
• If we were to quote every report the article would be 25 pages long at least

wikima 20:04, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Granted No, I don't understand. I don't konw what you want from me. How are there POVs? What are you talking about? -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 20:09, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

• You don't understand because you don't follow the discussion
• We have a summary on the report of France Liberté, which as such can make a whole article. Why? Because Arre suggested to avoid just quoting and using bullets as it is non encylopedic.
• So I am following his example and best practice by doing the same with FH.
• And you keep on reverting
• You are like inviting me to expand the report of France Liberté to a detailled section
• And there is defintively more reason to than with FH
• It's up to you.

20:22, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Addendum, I'll take your next revert as a clear invitation to do that. wikima 20:23, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Fine I won't use bullets. There is no way I can understand this sentence "And there is defintively more reason to than with FH." -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 20:29, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Addendum Word count on your version for the Freedom House entry: 33. The France Libertes entry: 281. My entry on Freedom House: 164. And you want to talk about balance? That's ridiculous, Wikima. Be rational here. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 20:33, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

• That's much better - Was it that difficult to understand? Why do we always need such long polemic with you for such things??
• FH rates only Morocco and Jordan as partly free in the Arab World. This must be mentionned.
• Your change refers to a previous report. The lates report [25] does not list "arbitrary killing" for instance.
• The report seems to completly forget about Polisario and Tindouf (a part from the POWs of course). The report on Algeria does not include any information on this – This must be mentionned

• The FH includes one page as summary on Morocco in an index on the whole world
• France Libertés' report is a dedicated indepth investigation which includes 56 pages on the crimes of Polisario
• You can count the words and establish the relation then if you like.
• But thanks for this remark, letr me know what is the rate of 164 words in relation to the FH report on Western Sahara and I'll adjust accordingly the report France Libertés Report

• All this I will update accordingly

wikima 20:12, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Changes

Section: Human rights in the Polisario controlled refugee camps

• Title of the section changed to make visible we talk about Polisario. We also say the Moroccan controled part of WS.
• “main article|Human rights in Algeria” removed. This is clearly an article about the human right in the Western Sahara conflict and not in the context of an Algerian article.
• Though the Algerian government is a main actor in the conflict and responsible for what happens in Tindouf and the Algerian military was directly involved in the crimes of Polisario
• . “On the contrary, the camps are sometimes presented as a model for running refugee camps democratically” is highly disputed.:

1. Indepth reports such as done by France Libertés and ESISC contredicts this.
2. Mohammed Abdelaziz is president of Polisario and of the so-called “sadr” since 30 years! What an example for democracy!
3. The other contrediction comes from Amnesty just in the paragraph after.

• The information of CLAIHR is to be tkane with high caution. With re to the Moroccan POWs this is what it states: “The prisoners informed us that they are generally well-treated and that they receive adequate food and water.” [26]
• Their quote shortened
• This an example of how such organisations can be blind as Frances Libertés criticises.
• This sectio will be checked on relevance and accuracy.
• Polisario denies it is communist but it was founded on a left wing communist ideology and was mainly supported by communist countries in the former communist bloc led by the Soviet Union (Algeria, Libya, Cuba etc...)
• Quote form the UNHR on sahrawi children in Cuba too long – Shortened

wikima 21:42, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I reverted most of this for rather obvious reasons.

• As for the claim that Polisario is or has been Communist, this is plainly bullshit. They were left-wing and described themselves as Socialist (in the sense of Arab Socialism, then the ideology à la mode in the Arab world) from 1973, but gradually abandoned that, and there has to the best of my knowledge not been any reference to any kind of Socialism in a Polisario document for over 15 years.
• The Cuba claims is a mainstay of Moroccan rhetoric, and the quotes from the UN that disputes that thesis is obviously very relevant to this debate. The Moroccan claims are presented, the Polisario claims are presented, and the UN's investigations should be quoted in whatever length needed to adress the claims by both parties. This edit seems mainly intended to remove material that the editor deems unsupportive of his viewpoint.
• That the camps are "sometimes presented" as models for running refugee camps is a fact, not a value judgment of these assertions. It is obviously in the encyclopedia's interest to register the political rhetoric of both parties. But the assertions of either side should of course not presented as facts either, but then they're not here -- on the contrary, the Moroccan view ("concentration camps") is equally clearly given, with the same kind of neutral tone ("this is what these people say, that is what the others say").
• About the reference to the Algeria human rights section, I seem to recall that was originally inserted by you (Wikima) or at your request. I left it in for now, but don't care either way. Remove it if you like. Arre 22:30, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Section Moroccans POWs held by Polisario

• Title changed from POWs to Moroccan Prisoners of War held by Polisario

1. Many users are not familiar with the abbreviation and/or non English native speakers.
2. As the article beginns with reports on Morocco it must be made ligible where is deals with polisario

• Polisario held parts of WS is POV. Polisario claims to control these parts of WS. Whether this is true is being disputed on the relative talk.
• "hotly contested by Polisario" removed as indrect POVs (by way of quote).

1. Irrelevant as it would be quite surprising if Polsiario agreed with the report
2. Morocco also hotly contest much of the accusations, do you make the effort to mention? Of course no!

• "unilateral" (releases ...) removed as inaccurate. Morocco is not accused of detaining POWs
• Feel free to correct or refine the language

wikima 20:46, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

• Addendum: The relation between cease-fire and the POWs topic to be clarified.
• Obviousely Polisario had broken agreements

wikima 20:56, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Comment on this: Morocco is indeed accused of holding POWs, by Polisario and many supporters. True or false, the accusation exists. As for "unilateral", that signifies simply that the releases were not carried out as a result of negotiations, but precisely as a result of a unilateral decision. Personally, I think that it is "obvious" that both Morocco and Polisario has broken various agreements, but please source whatever you want to prove by that. Arre 22:33, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Arre,

• Your reasons are not obvious to me.
• "Bullshit" is not the kind of terminology I use in my talks. Please avoid next time - Thanks.
• I have explained all my changes one by one. Do the same if you want to change and not just write two lines and drop away whole efforts of others.
• I will not repeat what I wrote above and maintain unless you discuss, but react to your last comments.

• Polisario was a left wing organisation. Socialist ideology? Probably, but then we are talking about socialism in the third world in the seventies which was ready for the armed fight to install the dictatorship of the Proletariat and not the social-democracy or social-liberalism of the 90s.
• The whole Eastern Bloc was socialist, even the Soviet-Union was socialist. Communism was considered to be the latest utopia.
• The left wing in Morocco especially at universities (where polisario first members and founders evolved) was radical (extreme gauche) and based on Marxist-Leninist ideology. If this is what you mean, happy to use this term for Polisario’s ideological roots.
• Some rests of these movements remain such as the Nahj party, one of the last Marxist-Leninist political parties in the world.
• All countries that directly and mainly supported Polisario (Algeria, Cuba, Libya etc...) belonged to the Soviet-Union led communist bloc.
• Cuba, a great partner of Polisario is still - next to North Corea - one of the surviving communist countries. Or do you prefer "socialist" for them? Or may be "mad"?
• The purpose here is not to explain the ideological origins of Polisario but to show why Polisario's ties to Cuba are so strong.

• You now think that "Morocco and Polisario have broken various agreements". I am impresed by this progress towards a more balanced view.
• I am sorry though, Polisario commited war crimes and crimes against humanity.

• Algeria human rights section: This is one of those things that need to be linked in two or many worlds in the same time.
• The article on Human rights in Algeria is almost empty (since in this country like in the tindouf camps very thing is just paradise). I will link it as "See also link"

• General remark: I am trying to summarise the article taking exactly your example as best practice.
• If you insist to quote whole sections of reports that suit your pro-polisarian position, so no problem. I will then balance the article by quoting whole sections of other reports.
• We will get then back to the situation you corrected yourself with a much uglier article and which we want to avoid now.
• Meanwhile I will revert to my changes.
• And, please discuss yours

Thanks - wikima 18:59, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

This is simply absurd. You call it a "minor change" to remove whole chunks of text and rewriting? I now reverted to the original, and we shall have to do this part by part. I don't disagree with all of your edits -- far from it -- but others are so grossly POV it's beyond belief. Describing Polisario as a "communist" organization probably made both El Ouali and Karl Marx turn in their graves... and quoting Ali Salem Tamek and Aminatou Haidar (both repeatedly detained and tortured, and both former Amnesty International prisoners of conscience) as examples of the liberty enjoyed by Sahrawis to criticize the government borders on propagandist self-parody.

Propose changes here on talk, one unit/chapter at the time, and we do them part by part. I will do the same, and there won't be a revert war. That's what was done before, and it worked fine. Arre 21:49, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

• Just beginn by youself and propose your changes before playing your game of injecting polisarian POV nicely
• I am describing the current situation and delivering sources.
• Aminatou Haidar travels with a Moroccan passeport on Polisario sponsorship
• She gave the interview I sourced to a Moroccan magazine (Le journal hebdomadaire)
• Mothing happened to both of them
• In the same time Telquel published an interview with the Spokesman of Chat Achahid
• Do you want to ignore this?? This is the absurd.
• I didn't call my changes minor but stated above that I followed your example of shortening ans summarysing instead of quoting whole reports.
• If you don't like your idea any more, well, we can quote reports. And witnesses as well as there are lots of former Polisarians who told much to the world. Unless you know better than them on Polisario and the issue.

Cheers - wikima 21:57, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Systematic bias: misrepresenting the proportions of int'l criticism

• Aminatou Haidar, whom I have met personally, certainly doesn't consider herself "free" in the occupied territories. She has been imprisoned several times, tortured, and lives under continual threat. The reason she can carry out oppositional activities now, is that she is in exile. She is dearly afraid of what will happen when she sets foot on Moroccan or Sahrawi soil again -- just last year, Ali Salem Tamek was arrested immediately on arrival at the airport.
• That a single Moroccan newspaper, on the extreme oppositional fringe of that country's politics (for which it has been repeatedely harrassed and fined huge sums of money), has had the guts to challenge authority yet again by publishing an interview with her, hardly changes this fact. Syrian and Burmese dissidents also manage to give interviews from time to time, and get away with it: that is not proof of the liberal attitude of their governments.
• Tel Quel, the other newspaper you cite, belongs to the same category of ultra-oppositional and repeatedly attacked newspapers as Le Journal Hebdomadaire. I direct you for info on the situation of both newspapers -- whose staff I respect and admire for their courage -- to Reporters Without Borders.
• As for the United Nations' Cuba reports, they could certainly be summarized or quoted more effectively. But the reason for their being there at all is that they refute the Moroccan government's allegations of fraud and repression in the framework of the UNHCR programme point by point: if the paragraph is to be shortened, this needs to be clear. It is not just a vague "counter argument" or a "counter report", it is the systematic rebuttal of every single accusation made by Morocco, in a report made at the kingdom's own request.
• What you are doing is taking two reports by two local/national institutes (France Libertes, a Socialist French HR org; and ESISC, a until recently unknown Belgian outfit that Reporters Without Borders describes as a "fake NGO" working for pay to benefit the Moroccan government), and trying to juxtapose that with the multitude -- hundreds, thousands of pages -- of material gathered by the world's top human rights organizations, such as Amnesty, Human Rights Watch, the World Org Against Torture, the UN, the Red Cross, Freedom House, and others. By quoting these two sole reports at length, you are trying to give the impression of parity in criticism of the both parties, which is not only to cheat readers of Wikipedia seeking a fair overview of international commentary on the issue, but also to severely misrepresent documented facts.
• For comparison, if an article about, say, Libya, would give as much space to the hecatombs of material amassed by international human rights organization criticising Muammar al-Qadhafi's goverment, and to two virtually unknown documents on the Libyan oppposition (one of whose credibility is in severe dispute, i.e. ESISC), that would be immediately recognized as a systematic bias to the article.
• In summary, I have no hope of convincing you on this issue, since you apparently only have one goal with your activities on Wikipedia -- i.e. promoting the Moroccan version of events in Western Sahara -- but I hope that other, neutral editors will see what is going on, and put a stop to it.

Best regards, and in the somewhat strained hope of still being able to do this without a revert war, or requesting mediation, Arre 22:57, 22 October 2006 (UTC).

Responses

• "Aminatou Haidar, ...": It is part of the propaganda war. I would be very surprised to hear Aminatou saying she is free to travel and give inflamatory speeches against Morocco. It is an insult to Aminatou's career to say she is carrying opposition because she is in exile: she has been an opponent since the eighties, and inside Morocco. And don't worry, nothing will happen to her when she comes back, even though she wil try to get imprisoned to prove the points she made during her trips. Ali Salem Tamek is a worrior(he is often dressed in military uniform ), and has been vocal about the re-start of war, and was teleguiding the riots, and he did not deny it, on the contrary, Abdelaziz officially declares him the official spokesman of the Sahrawi "human righs" activists.
• "That a single Moroccan newspaper, ...": Le journal hebdomadaire, Assahifa, Telquel, Aljarida alokhra(Now Nichane) are all very critic to the Moroccan policy in general and on the Sahara in particular. There is no publication like le journal hebdomadaire in all the arab world, in its critic to the state. No Arab leader is treated like Mohamed VI is criticized in the JH. Robert Menard, when in a visit to Morocco this year, said the level of freedom of the press in Morocco can't be compared by any North African country. No condamnation has been executed against the cited newspapers, and no journalist was imprisonned. Correct me if I am wrong. None of them had the fate of your follow countryman Ben chico.
• "As for the United Nations' Cuba reports,...": Can you Arre give me one reason why the young kids are sent by the thousands to Cuba instead of the very near Spain?. Don't tell me by chance.
• "...two local/national institutes (France Libertes, a Socialist French HR org;": it used to be one the first and biggest supporters of Polisario before it found out the about he crimes commited by it. Now it seems it is no more important!!
• "... and ESISC, ... that Reporters Without Borders describes as a "fake NGO" " RSF does not say it is fake, because it is a real ONG that has done reports and studies on different fields for different organisms. It is Aboubaker Jamai who said it is fake, and payed by the Moroccan gvt, but failed to prove it in court. The witnesses he tried to get to support him (a Spanish and an Algerian researcher) all let him down in court. Read again your referenced article.
• "For comparison, ..." Arre, I like your way of discussing, but please, don't let that style be contaminated by koavf's virus: the funny and non-sense comparisions to whatever comes to the mind: Mother Theresa, China, etc.
• "In summary, I have no hope of convincing you on this issue, ...": Bravo, here you talked correctly. It is not about convincing each other. I am a Moroccan, and have members of my family living in Dakhla for more that 20 years, and you are an Algerian activist working to give the Algerian official position and the Polisarian version on the Sahara. None of us will change his mind. BUT, it is about giving an article that is balanced and giving both views, and letting the reader decide himself not deciding on his behalf.
• "...but I hope that other, neutral editors will see what is going on, and put a stop to it." It is not in your interest that NEUTRAL editors get to know what has been injected by you and koavf here. I hope they will.

--A Jalil 22:20, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

propaganda / false informations

I've removed a picture of a so-disapeared person named "FATIMA LAHMAD" until a reliable source is given.--Yusuf ibn Tashfin (talk) 10:10, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

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External links modified

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I have just modified 25 external links on Human rights in Western Sahara. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

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External links modified

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• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110503215530/http://www.amnestyusa.org/all-countries/morocco-and-western-sahara/page.do?id=1011203 to http://www.amnestyusa.org/all-countries/morocco-and-western-sahara/page.do?id=1011203

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External links modified

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I have just modified 3 external links on Human rights in Western Sahara. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20081011235428/http://www.spsrasd.info/sps-e110304.html to http://www.spsrasd.info/sps-e110304.html
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• Added {{dead link}} tag to http://www.esisc.org%7Ceuropean/

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March 2022

1) When countries violate international law, condemnations usually follow (as was the case when the US "recognized" Morocco's "sovereignty" over the illegally occupied territory of WS). To date, it remains the only country to formally do so. 2) The source cited by the IP is a joke (just look at the Moroccan propaganda outlets cited in it, Moroccoworldnews.com, diplomatie.ma, etc.). 3) Treating the positions of the United Nations, the African Union, the international court of justice, the European court of justice, etc., as equal to those of a country that violate internal law would create a false balance. M.Bitton (talk) 14:28, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

"LGBT rights in the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect LGBT rights in the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 February 17 § LGBT rights in the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic until a consensus is reached. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 03:21, 17 February 2024 (UTC)