Resolution 2797 of the United Nations Security Council

Translated by Mariateresa Tauro

With 11 yes votes, 3 abstentions and 0 no votes, the United Nations Security Council has approved Resolution 2797/2025, thus marking a memorable turning point in the long-lasting discussion on the Western Sahara. The text, which renews the mandate of the MINURSO’s mission, recognises for the first time the 2007 Moroccan autonomy plan as the only concrete base to manage the territory, thus overcoming the possibility of a referendum for the self-determination that has paralysed the negotiation process for decades.

The Western Sahara issue dates back to 1975, when Spain abandoned its former colony and leaving it without a form of power. Morocco and Mauritania claimes the territory, while the Polisario Front, supported by Algeria, proclaimed the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR). The so-called Green March, organised by the King Hassan II, made over 300,000 Moroccans occupy the region peacefully, thus consolidating the presence of Rabat.

Since then, the conflict between the moroccan forces and soldiers of the Polisario Front has divided the territory and created tens of thousands refugees in the Tindouf camps, in Algeria. In 1991, the UN established MINURSO, whose task was to arrange a referendum for independence. However, disputes over the identification of those eligible to vote and political differences made the consultation impossible. In the following years, all mediation attempts - including the Baker II Plan in 2003 - failed among mutual oppositions.

Since 2000s, Morocco has worked towards a “negotiation realism” strategy. In 2007, Rabat proposed a regional autonomy plan, which envisaged wide administrative and cultural competencies for the Saharian popolution, but under the Reign supremacy. The project has gained international support thanks to the diplomatic activism carried by the King Mohammed VI, who has successfully presented Morocco as a stable and reliable player in North Africa and the Sahel region. Today, more than 30 African and Arab countries, along with the US, France, Spain and the UK, widely support the Morocco’s proposal. The support of the United States was decisive, as it had already officially recognised Moroccan sovereignty over the Sahara in 2020 under the Trump administration.

Algeria, a long-standing supporter of the Polisario Front, boycotted the vote, calling the resolution “a betrayal of the right of peoples to self-determination’” The Polisario, for its part, denounced its exclusion from the negotiation process, speaking of the “end of the Sahrawi dream” Nonetheless, over the last few years, the separatist movement has lost part of the international support: European and African sources have more than once express concern about the growing instability in the Tindouf camps region, where arms and fuel trafficking are rife and where the infiltration of terrorist organisations poses a real threat.

Few hours after the vote, the King Mohammed VI gave a television speech in which he defined the UN Resolution as “a victory of diplomacy and legitimacy”. The sovereign announced a review of the autonomy plan to adapt it to new international conditions and made a direct appeal to Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune to re-establish “fraternal and constructive relations” between the two countries. The king also invited Saharawi from Tindouf camps to come back to their “origin lands” and to take part in the Sahara economic development, where important infrastructural and logistic projects connecting Western Africa to the Mediterranean area are now taking place.

Few days after the United Nations decision, the European Union and Morocco have signed a new commercial agreement that applies preferential rates also to products coming from the Western Sahara.  Bruxelles justified this choice as a step towards an “inclusive development of local populations”, but the Polisario Front and numerous NGO consider it as an economic legitimization of the occupation.

Resolution 2797 does not put an end to the conflict, but changes its nature. The UN abandons the logic of waiting and referendums to embrace a pragmatic solution focused on stability, cooperation and regional development. Western Sahara security is now considered essential not only for the North Africa, but also for the whole sahelian area: the territory represents a strategic corridor for projects like the Nigeria-Morocco gas pipeline, the African digital networks and the Atlantic commercial routes.

50 years after the Green March, the Western Sahara enters definetely in the Morocco’s geopolitical sphere. For Rabat, this is the crowning achievement of a patient and consistent diplomatic vision; for Algiers and the Polisario Front, it is an inevitable downsizing. The international community seems to have chosen stability over uncertainty, autonomy over independence. The UN’s message is clear: after decades of impasse, it is time of actualization, no more of waiting.

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