A military commander in the Polisario Front was killed by a Moroccan drone

The leader of the Polisario Front gendarmerie was killed in a Moroccan drone attack on a disputed area in Western Sahara, a senior Sahrawi military official told AFP the night of Wednesday 7 to Thursday April 8th.

“The martyr National Gendarmerie Commander, Adha Al-Bendir, fell, on Tuesday, in Honor Square, where he was on a military mission in the liberated Ross Ayrni area in Tifariti.”, An area located in the north of the region and under the control of the Polisario, earlier announced a press release issued by the Saharan Defense Ministry published by the official SPS news agency, without further details. The agency removed the military statement from its website in the evening, without explanation.

This military commander, born in 1956 who joined the Polisario in 1978, was killed “In the aftermath of a drone attack”Then, a senior Sahrawi military official told France Press, on condition of anonymity. “Except for Al-Bendir had just participated in an attack in the Bir Helou area against the wall.” The official explained that there is sand that separates the two camps for more than a thousand kilometers in the Western Sahara. “A few hours later, a hundred kilometers from the site of the attack on the Moroccans, a drone killed the commander of the gendarmerie in the Tifariti region. He died in the liberated desert lands.”, he added.

The exact circumstances of the death remain unclear, with some unconfirmed reports of a drone strike in Twizky, in the south of the country. The Kingdom of Morocco. It was not possible to obtain information from an official source in Rabat. It appears to be the first time that the Moroccan military has resorted to a fatal drone strike in the conflict it pitted against the Sahrawi independence movement for decades. No official information has been filtered regarding the Moroccan acquisition of drones.

Ibrahim Ghaly “survived”

FAR-Maroc Forum, an unofficial Facebook page of the Moroccan Armed Forces, claimed this Several key elements The Polisario, including the chief of the gendarmerie, “They died” After the next Moroccan army operation Suspicious movements of Polisario leaders inside the buffer zones.. The present Ibrahim Ghaly, leader of the independence movement. “Survived” To the Moroccan process, this generally conscious forum added without further details.

After nearly thirty years of ceasefire, hostilities between Polisario and Morocco resumed in mid-November after Moroccan forces deployed in a buffer zone in the far south of Western Sahara to expel separatists who had blocked the only trade route to West Africa, because this is an illegal route according to them. .

For the first time in decades, armed clashes occurred between the Sahrawi People’s Liberation Army and Moroccan forces, according to the SADR Ministry of Defense. Alps claim daily attacks Targeting sites of the Moroccan occupation forces near the berm.As well as the Moroccan human and material losses, without being able to verify the authenticity of an independent source.

The Polisario Front, which declared the SADR in 1976, is still calling for a referendum planned by the United Nations at the time of the signing of a ceasefire between the belligerents in 1991. Morocco, which controls nearly 80% of this vast desert territory, is a Spanish colony A precedent, presenting a plan for self-government under its sovereignty.