A Sahrawi returnee swears allegiance to King Mohammed VI
Morocco, Politics, 5/5/2000

King Mohammed VI, who was accompanied by Prince Moulay Rachid, received on Thursday at the Royal palace in the northern city of Tangier Sheikh Ghaoutah Ould Mohamed Ould Ahmed Baba, a Sahrawi returnee who swore allegiance to the sovereign.

Sheikh Ghaoutah defected from the Polisario recently and returned to Morocco.

In a statement to reporters after the audience-- that was attended by the Moroccan minister of the interior-- Sheikh Ghaoutah called the international community, and mainly the high commissioner for refugees and other human rights organizations, to lift the siege imposed on Moroccan Sahrawis forcibly detained in the Tindouf camps, stronghold of the Polisario in southwestern Algeria.

He expressed hope to see "all the Moroccan Sahrawis return home for reunions with their relatives in the Moroccan Sahara, who live, he said, in peace and prosperity.

He briefed reporters on his career as a member of the Moroccan liberation army he joined in 1957 to fight Spanish occupation and struggle for the liberation of the Moroccan Sahara and how he joined in July 1978 the Polisario, where he acted as the gang's sheikh in the identification commission (of eligible voters in the referendum the U.N plans to hold in the Sahara). Sheikh Ghaoutah said he made tremendous efforts before he succeeded to get out of the Polisario's grip and return home.

Sheikh Ghaoutah, from the oulad Dlim tribe, oulad Baamar faction, was born in 1925 in the Moroccan southern city of Dakhla.

Previous Stories:
  Nineteen Moroccan Sahrawis flee Tindouf camps, return to Morocco   (2/17/2000)
  Housing first batch to relocate Sahrawis   (2/3/2000)
  Outpouring of grief in Tindouf compels Polisario to circulate release hailing late Hassan II's qualities   (7/30/1999)

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