CAPE TOWN, Dec. 12 (Xinhua) -- The South African government on Wednesday welcomed the resumption of peace talks aimed at resolving the Western Sahara issue.
"South Africa welcomes the recently concluded first round of negotiations held on December 5-6, 2018 in Geneva, Switzerland on the situation in Western Sahara," Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Lindiwe Sisulu said.
The talks, held after six years of suspended negotiations, will be followed by a second round-table meeting in the first quarter of 2019.
Sisulu said her country is pleased that Morocco and the Polisario Front have been able to meet to seek a political solution to the conflict.
South Africa is hopeful that this negotiations process, led by former Germen President Horst Kohler in his capacity as the Personal Envoy of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, will lead to a just, lasting, and mutually acceptable solution which will provide for the self-determination of the people of Western Sahara, Sisulu said in a statement.
"It is our hope that these negotiations are a step in the right direction towards reviving the long-stalled talks between the Polisario Front and Morocco," she said.
The negotiations took place in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 2440 adopted by the UN Security Council on October 31, 2018, which calls on the parties to show "political will and work in an atmosphere propitious for dialogue."
Sisulu pledged that South Africa will utilize its upcoming term on the UN Security Council (UNSC) to call on the UN to continue to support the right to self determination of the people of Western Sahara.
South Africa will serve its 2019-2020 term as a non-permanent member of the UNSC.
Western Sahara was partitioned between Morocco and Mauritania at the end of Spain's colonial rule in 1976. When Mauritania, under pressure from Polisario guerrillas, abandoned all claims to its portion in August 1979, Morocco moved to occupy that sector and asserted administrative control over the whole territory.
Fighting then broke out between Morocco and the Polisario Front, which is fighting for the independence of Western Sahara. A cease-fire was signed in 1991 and in that year, the UN mission, known by its French acronym as Minurso, was deployed to monitor the cease-fire.
