Thank you Chairman Kyaw Tint Swe and members of the Fourth Committee for the opportunity to address you about the situation in Western Sahara. Many of us involved with this issue have become increasingly frustrated as we have witnessed again and again the repeated obstruction by Morocco in preventing progress towards a referendum on self-determination. Because of the failure of the UN to hold Morocco accountable, it has made the UN a participant in the continual occupation of Western Sahara which has forced 170,000 refugees to remain in refugee camps unable to return to their homeland.

I want to address today specific points about this issue which I believe set a terrible precedent for the UN's role in settling conflicts: the role the UN has played in rewarding Morocco's aggression and obstruction and the role the UN has played in punishing good faith gestures.

In this long history, the Polisario has continued to operate in good faith working hard to find a just, fair, and peaceful solution, whereas Morocco has continued to flaunt international law and block any progress towards the referendum on self-determination. The very fact that Morocco invaded the country in reaction to the International Court of Justice's ruling that the Sahrawis had the right to self-determination, set the precedent.

At that time, the United Nations and the international community should have called for Morocco to withdraw from the territory. Instead, twenty-nine years later, the Western Sahara is the only colony in Africa that has not yet been decolonized. The citizens of Western Sahara living in the Occupied Territory are under a virtual house arrest where they are repeatedly jailed and tortured for speaking out on behalf of the UN plan for a free and fair referendum. Journalists and human rights organizations that attempt to visit the occupied Western Sahara are repeatedly blocked.

Meanwhile, the Polisario, believing in the good faith of the United Nations, agreed to a UN sponsored referendum even though it was their country that was illegally invaded and illegally occupied, even though they are the ones who have suffered as refugees in the Sahara desert for nearly thirty years.

So, from the very start, remember that Morocco has responded to international law by aggression and invasion and the Polisario has responded to international law by seeking peaceful resolution at their own risk and peril.

That very attitude was displayed again most recently with the Baker plan that calls for self-determination for the people of Western Sahara. Here the Polisario agreed to a compromise plan that was carefully crafted by former Special Envoy and former US Secretary of State James Baker. That plan was totally unfair to the Sahrawis because it allowed Moroccans living in the Occupied Western Sahara to vote in their referendum and it was very similar to a plan that Morocco had put forward several years earlier.

Yet, once again, displaying a willingness to put themselves at great risk and peril, the Polisario agreed to the plan, and Morocco rejected it once again displaying their complete lack of good faith.

Another case that highlights the dramatic difference between these two parties is the situation of the POWs and the citizens that have disappeared since the conflict and continue to disappear in Occupied Western Sahara.

While Morocco long claimed it had no POWS, the Polisario accounted for every single person they were holding allowing even the International Red Cross regular visits to Moroccan POWs. After denying for years that they held any soldiers or political prisoners, the Moroccans released 66 Sahrawi POWs in 1996. Yet, today, while the international community can account for every Moroccan POW because of the good faith gesture of the Polisario, there are still hundreds of Sahrawis both military and civilians who are unaccounted for, who have disappeared during the war and in recent years.

Thus, there is continual pressure by the UN and the international community on the Polisario to release all Moroccan POWS, but hardly ever any pressure on Morocco to release Sahrawis except by NGOs active on the issue. And why is that?

Because Sahrawis have been honest and open in their dealings with the international community and accounted for any POWS they held, while Morocco has once again flaunted international law and shown a disrespect for human rights and dignity.

And now this gets us to the question of where we are today. It is time for the United Nations to do the right thing and stop the obstruction by Morocco on this process. Delaying the resolution of this issue is a terrible injustice to the Sahrawi people, and sets a terrible precedent about the credibility and commitment of the United Nations.

A deadline should be set for the referendum under the context of the plan put forward by James Baker. If Morocco refuses to abide by the Baker plan, the referendum should go forward based on the previously approved voter registration list. Should Morocco once again obstruct this referendum, then it is time to call upon them to withdraw from their illegal occupation, something that the UN should have done in 1975.

Otherwise, the UN sets a terrible precedent by rewarding Morocco for aggression and invasion and penalizing the Polisario for honesty and openness, and most importantly, for trusting the United Nations.

Two years ago this body accepted the membership of a free nation, the world's youngest country, East Timor. The East Timor situation has many parallels to Western Sahara, and we hope that the UN will uphold the values it promised to uphold in 1991 when the Polisario agreed to a cease fire.