Sahara issue topping agenda of FM talks with Ethiopian President

The latest developments of the Sahara issue have topped the agenda of the meeting, Monday in Addis Abeba, between Ethiopian President Girma Wolde-Giorgis and visiting Moroccan Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation Mohamed Benaissa.

During the meeting, Benaissa handed to the Ethiopian President a message from King Mohammed VI.

Talks, according to a press release of the Foreign Ministry in Rabat, also dealt with "means to give a new impetus to bilateral relations namely through the next meeting of the Joint Commission."

Benaissa's visit to Ethiopia is part of a tour to African countries that already took him to Tunisia and Egypt where he handed similar messages to the leaders of those countries.

The Sahara issue is opposing Morocco to the Algeria-backed separatist movement "Polisario" which is seeking to separate the Moroccan Southern provinces, knowns as the Sahara, from the rest of the kingdom. The former Spanish colony was retrieved by Morocco in 1975 under the Madrid Accords signed with Spain and mauritania.