Tokyo (Japan), August 24, 2024 (SPS) – The ministerial meeting of the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) was inaugurated today in Tokyo, with the presence of the Sahrawi Foreign Minister, Mohamed Sidati, accompanied by the Sahrawi Republic’s Permanent Representative to the African Union, Lamin Baali, who attended the experts’ meeting yesterday.

Before the meeting began, the Sahrawi Foreign Minister had several discussions with his African counterparts to exchange views on the topics of the meeting, as well as on the unfortunate events that occurred during yesterday’s experts’ meeting.

The experts’ session yesterday witnessed a scandalous incident involving the Moroccan regime of occupation, whose diplomats could not stand the fact that the Sahrawi Republic was present alongside other African countries despite all the Moroccan attempts to obstruct this. One Moroccan diplomat assaulted the Sahrawi ambassador trying to steal the sign bearing the name of the Sahrawi Republic, prompting an Algerian diplomat to intervene, control the attacker, and hand him over to Japanese security, who then removed him from the room.

African diplomats who witnessed the incident expressed their solidarity with the Sahrawi delegation and condemned the Moroccan thuggery that surprised everyone.

In response to the rapid and widespread circulation of the incident, including via video evidence exposing Moroccan thuggery, Moroccan media quickly spread new lies, claiming that the Sahrawi Republic was not invited to the meeting and that the Sahrawi ambassador had entered as an intruder.

However, today’s meeting, attended by the Sahrawi Foreign Minister alongside other African counterparts and accompanied by the same Sahrawi ambassador, definitively refutes these Moroccan lies and exposes the falsity of the Moroccan media’s claims, which only broadcast lies and fabrications.

On another note, a journalist from the Sahara Press Service (SPS) observed that the Moroccan ambassador to the African Union, who participated in the non-diplomatic and unethical attack on the Sahrawi ambassador and other African diplomats yesterday, attended today’s ministerial meeting surrounded by two Japanese security guards, apparently to ensure he does not disrupt the meeting further. (SPS)

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