Oscar-winner Javier Bardem pleads Western Sahara cause at UN

Spanish actor Javier Bardem. AP

UNITED NATIONS—Oscar-winning actor Javier Bardem on Tuesday took up the cause of Western Sahara at the United Nations, demanding action to end human rights abuses and allow a self-determination vote in the disputed territory.

Bardem was to speak to the UN General Assembly’s decolonization committee about the former Spanish colony annexed by Morocco.

Going into the meeting, the Spanish actor said it was time for action now because the people of Western Sahara have been waiting two decades for a chance to decide their future.

“The people of the Western Sahara are suffering under repression inside the occupied territory; they are suffering in refugee camps in the Sahara Desert, where they have been forgotten for decades,” Bardem said in a statement distributed to reporters.

The actor, who is making a documentary about Western Sahara, said he would press the UN committee to take action about human rights, about holding a referendum.

Morocco moved into Western Sahara in 1975 as Spanish colonists left. Polisario Front guerrillas fought Moroccan forces until a UN-brokered ceasefire in 1991. A referendum was part of the deal but has never been held while attempts to reach a permanent peace deal are deadlocked.

Bardem highlighted how the UN mission in Western Sahara is the only UN country operation in the world that does not have a mandate to monitor human rights.

“This mandate has been repeatedly blocked by certain Security Council members,” he said in the statement. “This is an astonishing and unacceptable omission.”

Bardem told reporters that France, Spain and the United States were helping Morocco to block efforts to hold a self-determination referendum saying they were looking after their own “geo-strategic” and “economic” interests.

“You don’t want to believe that a conflict can happen,” he said, before adding that “patience is running out. And you don’t want that to happen.”

Bardem said he first went to Western Sahara in 2008 and has since organized a petition which was sent to the Spanish government. Bardem’s documentary movie about the conflict, “Sons Of The Clouds”, is being prepared for release next year, said director Alvaro Longoria.