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SAHARAUI ACTIVIST ON HUNGER STRIKE IN LANZAROTE
Staff Reporter / 2009-12-01 14:47:19
The Western Sahara human rights activist, Aminatou Haidar, began a hunger strike at Lanzarote Airport at midnight on Sunday 15th November, saying she will not eat until she is allowed to return to her home in the disputed territory’s main city, Laayoune.
The award-winning activist was arrested by the Moroccan authorities upon arrival in Laayoune. She had been travelling from the Canary Islands. She was allegedly arrested for writing Western Sahara as her nationality on the entry form at the airport, and was deported to the Canary Islands the following day.
Haidar was permitted to enter Spain with just her Spanish residency permit as her passport had been retained by the Moroccan authorities, but Spain’s Foreign Ministry says she can only leave the country with a passport. The 42 year old placed an official complaint at the police station at Lanzarote Airport, claiming that she is being held on Spanish territory against her will. As she told El País, ‘I’ve seen many things throughout my life, but I never imagined that the Spanish state’s complicity with Morocco would reach such a high degree. I would prefer a prison in the Sahara to being held in Spain.’
Spain’s Foreign Minister, Miguel Ángel Moratinos, told the EFE news agency on Sunday that ‘If, for administrative reasons, she has not complied with the requirements of the Moroccan government, all we have done is facilitate her entry into Lanzarote, nothing more or nothing less than any country must do for a citizen who has legal residency’.
Aminatou Haidar, who was granted Spanish residency on humanitarian grounds, was returning home to Laayoune after receiving the Civil Courage Prize from The Train Foundation in New York last month.
Tags: Hunger Strike, Canary Islands, Spain
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