On December 10, 2020, President Donald J. Trump reversed decades of U.S. policy by announcing that the United States would recognize Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara as part of a deal in which Morocco would normalize relations with Israel. Despite a 1991 UN truce and continued calls by the UN Security Council for Morocco and the Polisario Front to reach a mutually agreeable solution, neither side has relinquished its claim of sovereignty over Western Sahara. Trump's announcement ended nearly thirty years of U.S. support for UN-led negotiations and places the United States at odds with the majority of the international community, which swiftly criticized the U.S. action as a violation of the right to self-determination.

The roots of the Western Sahara dispute can be traced back to the territory's decolonization. In the mid-1970s, Spain began to decolonize Western Sahara,Footnote ¹ and both Morocco and Mauritania claimed sovereign control over the territory.Footnote ² To address the territorial dispute, the UN General Assembly referred the issue to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which issued an advisory opinion in 1975 stating that Morocco did not have a valid claim for sovereignty over Western Sahara.Footnote ³ Less than a month after the ICJ's opinion, 350,000 Moroccan civilians marched into Western Sahara in an effort to claim the territory.Footnote ⁴ Shortly afterward, Spain withdrew from Western Sahara and transferred joint control to Morocco and Mauritania.Footnote ⁵ The Polisario Front, which was established in 1973 as a socialist guerrilla movement, disputed Morocco and Mauritania's claims over Western Sahara.Footnote ⁶ Instead, it declared the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) and received recognition from Algeria and the African Union.Footnote ⁷ In 1979, Mauritania signed a peace treaty with the Polisario Front and abandoned its sovereignty claims over Western Sahara.Footnote ⁸ Following Mauritania's withdrawal, Morocco consolidated control over 85 percent of Western Sahara.Footnote ⁹ Due to the conflict, the majority of the indigenous people of Western Sahara, the Sahrawis, fled to refugee camps in Algeria and Mauritania.Footnote ¹⁰

For over a decade, Morocco and the Polisario Front fought a prolonged war over control of Western Sahara, which ended only after the United Nations mediated a ceasefire in 1991.Footnote ¹¹ Under UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 690, the UN established the Mission for the Organization of a Referendum in the Western Sahara (MINURSO) and called for a referendum.Footnote ¹² Despite the UN call, Morocco and the Polisario Front could not reach an agreement over who should be allowed to vote in the referendum.Footnote ¹³ Recognizing that the two sides might be unable to reach a solution by themselves, the UN began searching for alternative solutions.

The UN Security Council has repeatedly addressed the Western Sahara situation. In 2000, UNSCR 1301 asked Morocco and the Polisario Front to consider alternatives to a referendum.Footnote ¹⁴ In 2003, the UN secretary-general's personal envoy, former U.S. Secretary of State James Baker, proposed the Baker Peace Plan, under which the UN would organize a referendum for voters to choose integration with Morocco, autonomy, or independence.Footnote ¹⁵ Morocco, however, objected to the plan and declared it would not accept independence as a solution.Footnote ¹⁶ In 2004, UNSCR 1541 appeared to signal support for a mutually acceptable political solution, implicitly abandoning the Baker Peace Plan; the resolution reaffirmed “support for the Peace Plan for Self-Determination of the People of Western Sahara as an optimum political solution” and also reiterated support for the secretary-general's efforts to “achieve a just, lasting and mutually acceptable political solution.”Footnote ¹⁷ In 2007, UNSCR 1754 called on Morocco and the Polisario Front to negotiate toward a political solution that would allow for the Western Saharan people to determine their form of government.Footnote ¹⁸ Negotiations continued between Morocco and Western Sahara for another decade but largely ceased in 2019 after the resignation of the most recent UN envoy for Western Sahara, Horst Köhler.Footnote ¹⁹ On November 13, 2020, tensions escalated between Morocco and the Polisario Front after the two sides exchanged fire over a Moroccan government security cordon.Footnote ²⁰ On November 14, 2020, the leader of the Polisario Front, Brahim Ghali, declared the “resumption of armed struggle in defense of the legitimate rights of our people.”Footnote ²¹

The Western Sahara dispute centers on the right of the Sahrawis to self-determination. In 1960, UN General Assembly Resolution 1514 called for the end of colonialism and declared that “[a]ll peoples have the right to self-determination; by virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.”Footnote ²² In 1974, General Assembly Resolution 3292 applied the right to self-determination to the people of Western Sahara specifically, “reaffirming the right of the population of the Spanish Sahara to self-determination.”Footnote ²³ Based on Resolutions 1514 and 3292, the ICJ concluded in its 1975 advisory opinion on Western Sahara “that the decolonization process envisaged by the General Assembly is one which will respect the right of the population of Western Sahara to determine their future political status by their own freely expressed will.”Footnote ²⁴ Since 1963, Western Sahara has been listed as a non-self-governing territory pursuant to the UN Special Committee on Decolonization.Footnote ²⁵ Article 73 of the UN Charter obliges member states that administer non-self-governing territories to “recognize the principle that the interests of the inhabitants of these territories are paramount, and accept as a sacred trust the obligation to promote to the utmost, within the system of international peace and security established by the present Charter, the well-being of the inhabitants of these territories,” including through “develop[ing] self-government” and “tak[ing] due account of the political aspirations of the peoples.”Footnote ²⁶ Western Sahara, however, does not have an administering power; instead, the UN General Assembly considers the status of Western Sahara to be “a question of decolonization which remained to be completed by the people of Western Sahara.”Footnote ²⁷

Historically, the United States has joined the majority of states in maintaining a neutral position on the status of Western Sahara.Footnote ²⁸ Recent administrations had shown an increased willingness to engage with Morocco on the Western Sahara dispute, but prior to Trump's decision, the United States had neither recognized Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara nor recognized the self-declared SADR.Footnote ²⁹ Successive administrations also prohibited bilateral aid to Morocco from being used in Western Sahara in order to avoid the appearance of endorsing Moroccan sovereignty over the area.Footnote ³⁰

On December 10, 2020, the Trump administration announced that Morocco, after three years of negotiation, would join the Abraham Accords and begin to normalize relations with Israel.Footnote ³¹ The Moroccan government agreed to “resume diplomatic relations as soon as possible” and to reopen liaison offices with Israel that were closed in 2000 during the Second Intifada, a five-year-long Palestinian uprising against Israel.Footnote ³² At the same time, Trump announced that the United States would recognize Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara.Footnote ³³ President Trump's proclamation recognizing Morocco's sovereignty over Western Sahara stated, in part:

While the United States did not expressly address how its recognition is consistent with international law on self-determination, the White House clarified in a subsequent statement that that U.S. recognition of Moroccan sovereignty still “leaves room for a negotiated solution and the United States remains committed to working with Morocco, the Polisario, and all involved regional and international actors to support the necessary work ahead and create a more peaceful and prosperous region.”Footnote ³⁵ Furthermore, it emphasized that “President Trump urges all parties to constructively engage with the United Nations and consider creative and genuine ways to move the peace process forward.”Footnote ³⁶ On December 24, the State Department announced that it had begun the process of establishing a U.S. consulate in Western Sahara that would be managed by the U.S. Embassy in Rabat, Morocco.Footnote ³⁷ Until a physical consulate can be established, the United States will host a “virtual presence post” on the U.S. Embassy's website to provide “announcements and information about new programs that promote economic and business opportunities for the region.”Footnote ³⁸

Trump's announcement prompted criticism from current and former U.S. officials. Republican Senator James Inhofe criticized the decision as one where “rights of the Western Saharan people have been traded away.”Footnote ³⁹ Inhofe and a bipartisan group of twenty-six U.S. senators sent a letter to President Biden in February asking him to reverse the recognition decision. The letter stated, in part:

Former U.S. Secretary of State James Baker III, who later served as the UN special envoy for Western Sahara, published an op-ed criticizing the decision as contrary to international law and diplomacy.Footnote ⁴¹ Calling the decision a “major and unfortunate change in long-standing U.S. policy under both Democrat and Republican administrations,” he argued that the Abraham Accords should not “come at the price of abandoning the United States’ commitment to self-determination, the bedrock principle on which our country was founded and to which it should remain faithful.”Footnote ⁴² Baker also expressed concerns over the effect of Trump's decision on U.S. relations with Algeria, an ally of the Polisario Front, stating:

Trump's announcement also led international organizations to reaffirm their commitment to UN-mediated negotiations on Western Sahara's sovereignty. UN Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric reaffirmed that the UN position on Western Sahara had not changed, stating that “‘[t]here are no major operational changes from our part’” and that the UN believes a “‘solution can be found through dialogue based on the relevant Security Council resolutions.’”Footnote ⁴⁴ Likewise, a spokesperson for the European Union said that the EU's position regarding Western Sahara would be unaffected by U.S. recognition of Moroccan sovereignty, noting:

Others were more pointed in their criticism. Sidi Omar, the Polisario Front's UN representative, tweeted:

South Africa's governing African National Congress party criticized the decision and stated that “[t]he unalienable rights of the people of Western Sahara and Palestine to self-determination and freedom shall not be derailed by Trump's ‘deal.’”Footnote ⁴⁷

The Biden administration has yet to definitively comment or act on the Trump administration's recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara. When asked, a State Department spokesperson stated that he had “[n]o update,” and explained:

Mouloud Said, the Polisario Front's representative in the United States, expressed hope that the Biden administration will reverse Trump's decision, stating, “[s]omeone with the background of President Biden cannot ignore international law, and we are confident that he will not endorse the illegal transaction done by former President Trump.”Footnote ⁴⁹