In a statement issued on Monday, the Observatory urged these countries to establish legal frameworks to criminalize the group’s activities and cut off its sources of funding.
The statement voiced concern over what it described as “developments related to activities threatening security and stability, carried out by the so-called Polisario,” which it said posed “a real danger at both regional and international levels, due to its involvement in systematic attacks on civilians, participation in arms and drug trafficking networks, recruitment of children, and coordination with terrorist organizations active in the African Sahel region.”
It continued: “Moroccans highly value the recent initiative launched in the US Congress on a bill to classify the Polisario Front as a terrorist organization, considering it a constructive step that falls within international efforts to combat terrorism and curb separatist movements supported by external actors.”
In this context, Mohamed Tayyar, President of the National Observatory of Strategic Studies, stressed that “the importance of promoting legislative initiatives in countries around the world to classify the Polisario as a terrorist organization manifests on several interconnected levels, including legal, political, security, and diplomatic.”
On the legal front, Tayyar explained that it is about “granting legal legitimacy to Morocco’s position: when the parliaments or governments of certain countries adopt decisions or laws adding the Polisario to terrorist lists, Morocco’s stance in international forums benefits from legislative backing from abroad.”
He added that such classification allows these countries “to apply their anti-terrorism laws, including freezing the front’s assets, banning its activities, and restricting the travel of its leaders. This means any financing or cooperation with the front becomes a criminal offense subject to prosecution in those states.” On the security and strategic level, Tayyar said, “this considerably reduces the group’s ability to operate beyond borders, as its designation as a terrorist organization blocks its free movement across various areas and tightens the net around its logistical networks.”
According to him, this measure also “integrates the issue into the global war on terror,” making “any activity by the front part of an international security threat, no longer just a regional conflict.”
On the political and diplomatic side, Tayyar noted that “classifying the Polisario as a terrorist organization leads to its diplomatic isolation: when numerous countries adopt this position, the group’s political room for maneuver shrinks, and it becomes difficult for it to secure public support.”
The security expert added: “This classification also exerts political and media pressure on states or entities that support it.”
He further stressed that, diplomatically, “the impact translates into a shift in the international narrative: moving from a so-called ‘right to self-determination’ to a matter of ‘counter-terrorism’,” a narrative change that serves Morocco’s cause.
From a media and symbolic perspective, “it also changes the perceived image: the classification places the Polisario’s name among violent groups rather than political movements, influencing international public opinion,” Tayyar concluded, noting that each country adding the Polisario to its terrorist list becomes a new asset in Morocco’s media and diplomatic discourse.
Editorial team/le7tv