Polisario leader arrives in Algeria amid tension between Spain and Morocco

Brahim Ghali Polisario secretary general and president of the self-proclaimed Sahrawi Arabic Democratic Republic, delivers a speech during the PF’s extraordinary congress on July 9, 2016 [FAROUK BATICHE/AFP via Getty Images]

The leader of the Polisario Front, Brahim Ghali, landed in Algiers early on Wednesday after being hospitalised in Spain for more than a month. His presence in the city of Logrono triggered a diplomatic row between Madrid and Morocco.

As MEMO reported yesterday, Spain’s Supreme Court rejected a custody request for Ghali, who faces allegations of war crimes. No restrictions were imposed on him, so he was allowed to leave the country. Polisario Front spokesman Jalil Mohamed confirmed that Ghali had arrived in Algiers a few hours after he appeared via video link before the court.

It should be noted that Madrid refused to allow an Algerian jet to enter Spanish airspace on Tuesday, apparently at the request of the army. Civil aviation authority ENAIRE said that a jet flying from Algeria to Logrono was turned back by air traffic controllers who told the pilot that his aircraft could not enter Spanish airspace without authorisation.

READ: Spain and the issue of Western Sahara

Unless otherwise stated in the article above, this work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If the image(s) bear our credit, this license also applies to them. What does that mean? For other permissions, please contact us.