MEP Slams Brussels' Inaction on Embezzlement by Polisario and Algeria of Humanitarian Aid

Brussels - Too much is too much! This is the cry of despair of MEP Nicolas Bay in the face of Brussels’s inaction in the face of the continued embezzlement of European humanitarian aid by the Polisario and Algeria.  "Why does Brussels refuse to investigate these acts despite the accumulating evidence? Why does the EU continue to send nearly 10 million euros per year of equipment to a camp which it does not even know the real number of refugees? This money is that of the taxpayer of European countries: it is time to demand accountability from Brussels and Algeria!", the French MEP underlined in a release issued on Wednesday. 

The MEP recalls that in January 2015, a European Union report drawn up in 2007 by the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) was finally published, "revealing a system of massive diversion of humanitarian aid orchestrated by the Polisario Front - an armed movement which claims part of the Moroccan Sahara - with the complicity of Algeria”.  This damning report, he said, indicated that "the real number of refugees in the Tindouf camps, controlled by the Polisario in western Algeria, was completely unknown: the authorities prohibit the EU from sending a mission there to assess the situation.”  The MEP recalls that a hearing at the European Parliament in July 2015 even revealed that "Algeria, which receives aid at the port of Oran, taxed 5% of the aid sent!."  Noting that these acts continue to date and that "a large part of humanitarian aid is sold each year in Mauritania to finance the Polisario and its operations against the territorial sovereignty of Morocco", the MEP calls on Brussels to action against this large-scale traffic.  The independent news site EUtoday.net published new evidence on Tuesday of the continued embezzlement of humanitarian aid by the Polisario and Algeria despite the European Commission’s promises to end it.  This evidence was exposed by the European information website "EUToday" on the basis of investigations it carried out on the ground and through damning testimonies.