HIBAPRESS – Shafiq Annouri
Stephen Witkoff, the US Special Envoy for Peace Missions, announced last night, Sunday, that his team is working to reach a peace agreement between Morocco and Algeria within the next two months.
This came in an interview on the 60 Minutes program broadcast by the American channel "CBS News", where Witkoff expressed his hope to open a path of de-escalation between the two sides, confirming that there are continuous diplomatic efforts to prepare the appropriate conditions for dialogue. Witkoff's statement drew the attention of a number of international media outlets, given the continuation of the political rift between Rabat and Algeria for 4 years, and what any breakthrough in this file could represent in terms of a possible change in the region's balances. Algeria unilaterally severed its relations with Morocco in August 2021, because of what it described as "the continuation of hostile acts", which are baseless claims. The tone of Algerian officials towards Morocco has changed markedly recently, as President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, in his periodic dialogue with the media, avoided talking about the Sahara file, before avoiding mentioning the words "referendum" and "independence" in a subsequent speech, and confirming that Algerians should not be more Sahrawis than the Sahrawis.
