Polisario declares general mobilisation ten days after the UN mission’s mandate ended

A declaration issued in the evening, ten days after the peacekeepers left

On the evening of Tuesday 10 November, the Polisario Front’s National Secretariat declared a state of general mobilisation. The decision came at the end of an emergency meeting chaired by Brahim Ghali, the movement’s secretary-general and the president of the self-proclaimed Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, and was carried by the movement’s news agency, Sahara Press Service, from Shaheed El Hafed.

The statement said the decision answered what it called escalating Moroccan military movements. It accused Morocco of deploying large numbers of troops and weapons at positions along the separation wall, the sand barrier that divides the Moroccan Sahara, and called on Sahrawis to remain fully prepared to confront any threats. It also called on the United Nations and the African Union to press Morocco to end its presence.

What the declaration did not contain was as striking as what it did: no figures, no places, no dates, no deployment orders, and no concrete measure beyond the call to stand ready. The words arrived the same day the General Assembly debated the veto that ended the UN mission.

The sequence that brought the file to this point

For 35 years, from 1991, the mission known as MINURSO monitored the ceasefire in the Moroccan Sahara and was to prepare a referendum that never took place. Its mandate expired on 31 October 2026, after the Security Council failed to renew it: Russia vetoed the United States-drafted renewal on 30 October, and a rival Russian draft then failed, drawing two votes in favour, one against and eleven abstentions. The American draft, which would have extended the mission a year and made the autonomy plan the only basis for talks, had eleven of the fifteen Council members behind it, including France and the United Kingdom.

The liquidation began on 1 November. About 150 military personnel are being withdrawn, thirteen bases are being shut down, and the Secretary-General has named Alexander Ivanko, his former special representative, to lead the winding down. The mission had operated from nine team sites on both sides of the berm, the 1,700-mile sand wall built in the 1980s.

Morocco’s position has been stated plainly. On 30 October, Rabat assured that it intended to respect the ceasefire, and the royal court later reiterated the kingdom’s full commitment. His Majesty King Mohammed VI chaired a working session with senior officials at the Royal Palace on 4 November. The ceasefire dates to 1991; the Polisario declared it over in November 2020, and low-level fighting has continued since. Early in 2026, the four parties held three rounds of talks convened by Staffan de Mistura; in early October he told the Council they had ended in stalemate.

What the declaration leaves unanswered

The first unknown is the claim at the centre of the declaration. No independent confirmation of the alleged Moroccan troop movements along the wall has been published, and the statement offered no location, no unit and no date that could be checked. Until an outside observer, a satellite image or an official denial with detail appears, the movements remain an allegation.

The second unknown is what general mobilisation means in practice. The declaration names no units, sets no timetable and orders no deployment. The movement’s ambassador to the United Nations, Sidi Omar, has framed the posture as conditional, telling PassBlue that if Morocco tried to take the remaining territory east of the berm, the movement would resist; a warning, not an announcement of an offensive.

The third unknown is what the United Nations will do next: the 10 November debate was procedural, under Resolution 76/262, and produced no new mandate and no new mission. The fourth is Algiers: Algeria hosts the camps and backs the movement, and its press gave the declaration a wide echo, but no official Algerian statement has appeared so far. The fifth is the simplest: whether the coming days bring any movement of forces at all, or whether the declaration settles as rhetoric that changed nothing.

The first test of a file without its peacekeepers

The declaration matters first because it is the first major move since the peacekeepers left. For 35 years the mission’s observers stood between the two sides’ claims; now a claim about troop movements cannot be checked, because the patrols are gone. A file managed by presence is now managed by statements, and statements escalate faster than patrols do.

It matters second because of the week it lands in. The General Assembly debated the veto on the same day the declaration was issued, and France’s foreign minister arrives in Morocco this week for talks and a peace forum in Essaouira. The declaration answers a diplomatic sequence that has been moving against the movement.

And it matters third because the risk is no longer theoretical. With no observers in place, a small incident east of the berm would be reported by the parties alone, each in its own terms; and the declaration lowers the threshold for the movement to call it the attack it warned about.

A declaration designed to be heard in New York, not fired across the berm

The strongest reading is that its target was never the wall. It was the General Assembly debate under way the same day, and the diplomatic week around it: the French foreign minister’s visit to Morocco and the treaty of friendship taking shape between Paris and Rabat. A mobilisation, even a paper one, changes the subject from recognition to risk.

The absence of operational detail is the evidence for that reading. A genuine mobilisation order carries units, sectors and dates; this one carries a call to readiness and an appeal to the United Nations and the African Union. It asks the institutions to intervene; the language of a party seeking protection. The movement’s ambassador framed it the same way to PassBlue: if Morocco moved, the movement would resist.

None of that makes the declaration harmless. The mission’s departure removed the one mechanism that could settle a factual dispute about the wall quickly, and the declaration is built on exactly such a dispute. If either side now reports an incident east of the berm, there will be no UN patrol to check it, and the declaration will already have told an audience to expect one.

Set against the five dimensions, the picture is consistent: a Council deadlock that removed the buffer, phosphates and fisheries raising the stakes, camps waiting decades for a referendum that never came, and a 2,700-kilometre wall at the centre.

What moves next, and in what order

First, the United Nations. The Secretary-General’s spokesman and the personal envoy, Staffan de Mistura, are the two voices that can lower the temperature with a sentence, and their silence or statement will be the first signal.

Second, Algiers. Algeria hosts the camps, backs the movement and carries the file; its official line will show whether this is a Polisario decision alone or part of a wider Algerian posture.

Third, Rabat’s posture east of the berm. Morocco has said it will respect the ceasefire, and the analysts split: Intissar Fakir of the Middle East Institute judges it unlikely that Rabat would push beyond a barrier that already works; Walid Blila of Vytautas Magnus University expects the Moroccan army to deploy across the whole territory.

Fourth, the diplomatic calendar. The French foreign minister’s visit this week, the treaty of friendship and cooperation, and the King’s proposed state visit to France in January all assume a stable file; a Sahara incident would land in the middle of that sequence.

The dates that will tell whether this was a signal or a step

The coming days will answer the question the declaration leaves open. Any statement from the Secretary-General or de Mistura, any Moroccan or Algerian response, and any report of movement near the wall will show whether the mobilisation is gathering force or settling as rhetoric.

The French foreign minister’s meetings in Morocco this week, including his appearance at the women’s peace forum in Essaouira, will be watched for any signal on the Sahara file, and the treaty’s four unsettled points will show whether Paris and Rabat let the declaration slow their timetable.

If the week passes without an incident and without a further declaration, the mobilisation will stand as a signal; a movement reminding the world that it remains armed, organised and impatient, in a territory where the peacekeepers have gone and the referendum never came. If an incident follows, the same words will read differently.