PUSL.- On Tuesday, Isabel Lourenço, a member of the Fundación Sahara Occidental and collaborator of Pusl, presented the “Report on the abuse of the rights of Saharawi children and students in the occupied territories of Western Sahara”. The presentation was organized by the Center for African Studies of the University of Porto (Portugal).
The presentation of this report aroused great interest among university students, professors and researchers and journalists.
The report denounces in detail the terrible situation of continued violence suffered by Sahrawi children and students in the occupied territories of Western Sahara.
It highlights not only the traumas suffered by these young people, but also how they see the occupation, the presence of MINURSO, that 76% of the 300 respondents classify as tourists and other aspects of the life under occupation.
84% of the 150 children interviewed between the ages of 6 and 15 suffer from anxiety.
The report also addresses the situation in universities and young people in arbitrary detention.
“We are never safe, neither at school, nor on the street, nor even at home, they can come at any moment and take you or beat you.” At school they insult us, beat us … they want us to think that we are stupid, useless, that Moroccan children are better, some Moroccan children behave like adults, they are never punished when they are bad to us, I can not sleep, I always have things in my head and in my heart, sometimes my My heart beats so fast I can not breathe.
Kamal 11 years old,. Aaiun – Occupied Western Sahara
The report, which will soon be available on the website of the Center for African Studies at the University of Porto, is based on fieldwork conducted over five years (since 2013) by Isabel Lourenço and interviews conducted during this period in the Western Sahara, Morocco (Agadir, Marrakech, Tangier and Rabat), Spain and France, as well as questionnaires and interviews between January 2017 and September 2018 by 150 children (6-15 years) and 150 students (age 16 to 24 years)
