Algeria rips House appropriators over Sahara coercion
Algiers is furious at pro-Moroccan language in the annual foreign aid bill.
Algeria is warning US lawmakers of "consequences" if they continue siding with regional rival Morocco in the dispute over the Western Sahara.
In a letter to House appropriators late last month, Ambassador to Washington Madjid Bouguerra expressed his "deep disappointment" with language in the pending annual foreign aid spending bill that echoes Rabat's stance on the decades-old conflict. Morocco claims the disputed territory and administers about 85% of it, while many indigenous Sahrawis have taken refuge across the border in Tindouf, Algeria.
The ambassador in particular objects to a new provision in this year's draft bill that instructs the State Department to pressure Algeria to cooperate on a UN census of the Sahrawi refugee camps. Algeria insists the pro-independence activists in the camps have a right to self-determination under international law.
"The Embassy of Algeria does not understand nor does it accept this undue reference to Algeria in the context of an issue to which it is not a party," Bouguerra wrote in a June 24 letter obtained by Al-Monitor. "I respectfully draw your attention to the seriousness and the consequences of such an unwarranted and objectionable provision."
