Western Sahara:Leading Western Sahara human rights activist Ali Salem Tamek spoke in Dublin yesterday of his fears that he will be arrested by Moroccan authorities on his return home this weekend.
Located on the northwest coast of Africa, Western Sahara (population variously estimated at 187,000 and 273,000) was formerly under Spanish control but Madrid relinquished its claim in 1976. Most of the territory is held by Morocco, whose control is disputed by the Polisario Front independence movement.
A UN plan for a referendum on the status of the disputed territory has never come to fruition.
Moroccan forces built a security wall of sand and stone between the areas under their control and the territory held by the Polisario Front. Mr Tamek says he agrees with Polisario policies but will not say whether or not he is a member, stressing that he is "only a human rights defender in occupied territory".
He came to Ireland at the invitation of the Front Line human rights organisation in Blackrock, Co Dublin. He had a meeting last week with officials from the Department of Foreign Affairs and on Wednesday will meet the human rights subcommittee of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs.
The last time Mr Tamek was arrested was July 28th, 2006, in the airport of El Aaiún as he was arriving in Western Sahara from the Canary Islands. He was taken with a group of his associates to the "Black Jail" in El Aaiún for 10 days. He alleges he was "kidnapped" from there and taken to Ait Melloul prison in Casablanca, and that three days later he was accused of being "pyschologically sick" and taken to a pyschiatric hospital.
He is concerned that he could be picked up again when he returns home. Asked why he was targeted by the Moroccan authorities, he replied: "Because of my political opinions, because I am a defender of self-determination for the Sahrawi people and because of my trade union and human rights activities."
Mr Tamek has been imprisoned five times by the Moroccan authorities since 1992 and served a total of "almost four years". He has been on hunger strike 22 times for periods ranging from 48 hours to 52 days.
His wife, Aicha Chafia, a political refugee in Spain, alleges she was subjected to multiple rape by a group of Moroccan security agents after paying a visit to her husband in Ait Melloul prison in June, 2003.
Although Mr Tamek alleges he was tortured the first three or four times he was imprisoned, more recently he has been "treated like a political prisoner".
He attributes this to pressure from human rights organisations and the European Parliament, and his jailers' fear that they might exacerbate his health problems.
