LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Western Sahara Conflict: Security Council
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At the start of Baker's mandate, the Security Council appeared unanimously supportive of his efforts to help resolve the Western Sahara conflict. The first cracks in this support emerged when the Council was informed that the settlement plan no longer appeared likely to resolve the conflict, and the idea of finding a political solution, asking for compromises from both sides, was floated. The partisanship within the Council on behalf of one or the other party became more evident, and nowhere did it express itself more clearly than when it was asked to decide among the four options that would not require the consent of the parties. This the Council refused to do. The Council asked instead for another plan that would provide for self-determination, which it supported unanimously. However, when Morocco rejected the plan, the Security Council took no action and started talking again about searching for a consensual solution, despite the fact that it had been clearly told that this was not possible.
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"The Western Sahara conflict is the number one impediment standing in the way of regional cooperation, especially between Morocco and Algeria. A peaceful negotiated solution would pave the way for more cooperation on security and economics," said Jacob Mundy, a Western Sahara expert at the Middle East Research and Information Project in Washington, D.C.
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The politics of the least-worst option in Western Sahara are no longer working. The time has come for a new approach. The Security Council has to confront the Moroccan occupation of Western Sahara and bring it to a legal and practical end using the weapons of non-violence at its disposal.
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James Baker resigned as UN Secretary General Personal Envoy to the Western Sahara in June 2004, due to the lack of means for imposing a solution on the conflicting parties. In the initial draft of the Security Council resolution that endorsed his peace plan, the Plan could be imposed on the parties. However, in order to avoid the French veto, the final text stressed the approval of the parties as a requisite for its implementation. Once the Plan was accepted by the Polisario, the ball was in the Moroccan court. But the final version of the Security Council resolution (no. 1495) and the lack of political will of the permanent members (together with the French active support of Morocco), meant that Rabat could block the peace plan that had been defined by the Security Council as the ‘optimum political solution’ without receiving any legal sanction.
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James Baker, Kofi Annan’s personal envoy to the Western Sahara has given the parties two more months to respond to his latest proposals. Baker’s tour of the region took him to Rabat, Algiers, Tindouf and Nouakchott for discussions with heads of state in his latest attempt to resolve the Western Sahara conflict. He has not yet revealed publicly what his revised offer is, but has invited comments from the parties to be given by March 1st. MINURSO’s mandate, which currently expires on January 31st looks likely to be extended until the end of March by the UN Security Council
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While the Security Council has not called on Morocco to actually present an autonomy plan for Western Sahara in any of its resolutions, , Morocco itself has been promising to do so since the time of Baker's resignation. Member states, both within the Security Council and without, have been calling on Morocco to submit such a proposal. But it is not clear that those who have been requesting such a proposal have given much thought to the implications of Morocco doing so.
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