Category Archives: Phosphate importation

Australian Labor Party Resolution on Western Sahara, 18 Dec 2018

Lesley Osborne, Professor Damien Kingsbury, Kamal Fadel, Polisario Representative, ALP Conference, Dec 2018

The Australian Labor Party National Conference held in Adelaide on 16-18 December 2018 adopted a positive resolution on the question of Western Sahara urging the UN to proceed without further delay with the organisation of the referendum of self-determination and to press Morocco to implement all UN resolutions pertaining to Western Sahara and calling on the Australian Government to ensure Australian companies have regard to international law regarding the importation of resources and products from the occupied areas of Western Sahara until the legal status of the Territory is determined and the Saharawi people are allowed to exercise their inalienable right to self-determination in accordance with relevant UN resolutions and Peace Plan of 1991.

Text of the Resolution:
Australian Labor Party Resolution on Western Sahara
Adopted by the National Conference on 18 December 2018 in Adelaide
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Stop Western Sahara plunder, Jacinda

Photo credit: The Atlantic

By Peter Kenworthy
Pambazuka News, Voices for Freedom and Justice, Oct 08, 2018

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern spoke of human rights and international cooperation when she addressed the United Nations in September.
But what will she do about the fact that two New Zealand companies are the last buyers of phosphate rock from occupied Western Sahara?
Read article from Pambazuka News >

Thanks to New Zealand, I have spent all my life in a refugee tent

Najla Mohamed-Lamin in the refugee camp in Algeria where she grew up

By Najla Mohamed-Lamin – a Saharawi refugee now studying in the United States
stuff.co.nz; 21 September 2018

OPINION: I have never been to New Zealand. But what happens in the ports of your country is deeply affecting me and my people. As a refugee, living on the other side of the world, I am disturbed by the role that a country, so far away, can play in the conflict that has made my life so complicated.
A series of articles has recently been published by Stuff, regarding New Zealand’s imports of phosphate rock from Western Sahara. That is my homeland, occupied by Morocco.
New Zealand is the now the only country in the world that buys phosphate rock from Western Sahara. Importers in the United States and Canada have just terminated the controversial imports.
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Expert says New Zealand doesn’t need to keep buying phosphate from Western Sahara

Tony Wall, National Correspondent, www.Stuff.co.nz
14 September 2018
New Zealand could easily stop buying “stolen” phosphate from the occupied Western Sahara and use a more environmentally friendly version, a soil scientist and independent fertiliser operator says.
The Stuff series Growing Pain has shone a light on how New Zealand has been thrust into the centre of the world’s most protracted refugee crisis by continuing to buy phosphate from the bitterly disputed region.
The Saharawi people consider the phosphate to be stolen by Morocco, which annexed their territory in the 1970s

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Western Sahara refugees urge PM Jacinda Ardern to step in over phosphate trade

The NM Cherry Blossom, which had been headed for Tauranga, was forced to anchor 4km off the South African coast, costing $10,300 a day.

Charlie Mitchell
Stuff NZ, September 12 2018

Refugees who blame New Zealand for a long-running stand-off in the Western Sahara have made a direct plea to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who is among the few Westerners to have visited their camps.
A delegation of representatives from Morroco is in Wellington this week to make their case over the ongoing purchase of minerals from the region by two New Zealand fertiliser co-operatives. Phosphate taken from a mine in the region is considered by the Saharawi people to be stolen by Morroco, which annexed the area in 1975.
The Green Party is calling for a select committee inquiry into the trade and will meet with the Moroccan delegation on Thursday to raise its concerns…

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NZ’s reliance on ‘stolen goods’

The world’s longest conveyor belt in the Sahara Desert.

A series of three special reports by Charlie Mitchell
Stuff NZ, September 12 2018

* In Part one: Precious rock New Zealand is accused of stealing from the Sahara
*  part two of Growing Pain, a Stuff series, Charlie Mitchell reports on New Zealand’s tarnished reputation as a humanitarian nation in the eyes of those stuck in refugee camps in Algeria.
* In part three of Growing Pain, a Stuff series, Charlie Mitchell explains the strange bind that keeps New Zealand companies returning for more phosphate from Western Sahara.

Australian Greens National Conference adopts strong resolution on Western Sahara

The Australian Greens National Conference held in Brisbane on 19 & 20 May 2018 adopted the following resolution on Western Sahara:

 “That National Conference:

1. Strongly supports the right of the Saharawi people to self-determination and independence and urge the UN to organise a free and fair referendum on independence in Western Sahara without further delay;
2. Condemns human rights abuses in the areas of Western Sahara occupied by Morocco and urge the UN to extend the mandate of its mission in Western Sahara (MINURSO) to include human rights monitoring and reporting. The territory should also be opened for other international observers, such as NGOs and the media;

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Western Sahara has won its conflict cargo case in South Africa

The Moroccan state company OCP has decided to drop defending the detained conflict mineral cargo in South Africa. The Saharawi people thus won a 5 million USD walk-over victory before the trial over phosphate rock ownership even had begun.

On 1 May 2017, the bulk vessel NM Cherry Blossom was detained in Port Elizabeth, on a stop-over to New Zealand. The vessel contained 55.000 tonnes of phosphate rock from occupied Western Sahara.

The UN has concluded that any exploitation of resources in Western Sahara would be illegal if the Saharawi people do not consent to it. Similarly, the Court of Justice of the EU on 21 December 2016 judged that trading with the territory would be illegal without such consent. However, Morocco, illegally occupying parts of Western Sahara since 1975, has kept the exports of Western Sahara phosphate rock. In 2016, Morocco earned over 200 million USD from the rock export from the territory.

The second biggest importing country is New Zealand, where two farmer co-operatives import from the occupied territory.

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Saharawi government response to the withdrawal of a defence in the case of a cargo of phosphate rock detained en route to New Zealand from occupied Western Sahara

Bir Lehlu Western Sahara

13 July 2017

The government of the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic (the SADR) and the Saharawi national liberation movement, the Polisario Front, welcomed an announcement today that there would be no further defence of a case by Morocco’s state company OCP SA over a cargo of phosphate mineral rock detained under court order in South Africa.

The 55,000 tonne cargo had been illegally exported from occupied Western Sahara in April for delivery to the New Zealand fertilizer company Ballance Agri-Nutrients Limited.  Carried aboard the m.v. NM Cherry Blossom, it was detained on May 1 under a civil court order after an application by Saharawi authorities in South Africa’s High Court.  On June 15, the Court determined that the claim should proceed to a full trial, noting that the Saharawi government had prima facie ownership of the cargo.  A copy of the decision in Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic and Another v Owner and Charterers of the MV ‘NM Cherry Blossom’ and Others [2017] ZAECPEHC 31 is available at: <www.saflii.org/za/cases/ZAECPEHC/2017/31.html>.

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Perpetuity can not overshadow the $ 200 million annual stolen phosphate

Equip Media EMSahara

9 June 2017

Equip Media

Monday, June 5th 2017. The trial of the Saharawi political prisoners of the Gdeim Izik group opened before the Court of Appeal in Salé – Morocco. activists for the independence of Western Sahara and Human rights defenders , but also the lawyers by their absence protest against this unfair trial whose first hearings were held on March 13th 2017 after months of postponements.

On June 6th, in the space authorized for the Saharawi demonstrations, surrounded by the hubbub of Moroccan sound systems friends of Sid Ahmed Lamjayed sentenced to life imprisonment expressed their support and demands, among 80 other demonstrators.

On the panels we could read “Agrium shame on you”, “The phosphate is Sahrawi, and it belongs to our people”.

Sid Ahmed Lamjayed is the president of the CSPRON The committee to support the peace settlement and to protect the natural resources in Western Sahara. Continue reading →