06 Jan 2021; MEMO: Mauritanian MPs called to enact legislation criminalising the normalisation of relations with the Israeli occupation.
In a joint statement the Union of Forces of Progress (UFP), People's Progressive Alliance (APP), and the Alliance for Justice and Democracy (AJD) opposition parties said: "In light of the expanding circle of political and economic normalisation with Israel and its echo reaching the Maghreb region and African states, it is no longer a secret that normalisation advocates are exerting many pressures, both overtly and in secret, to get more countries aboard this sinister train."
The statement called on all parliamentary blocs to make an urgent effort to reflect the reality of the permanent historical national consensus held since the establishment of the Mauritanian state to fully support just and emancipation causes, the most prominent of which is the Palestinian issue.
The statement added that "the crime of normalisation, apart from constituting a violation of the consensus of the peoples of the world who advocate for peace, freedom, and anti-colonialism, stands for accepting all the crimes on which the brutal Zionist entity was founded and continues to commit on a daily basis."
The former Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz took the decision to freeze Mauritania's relations with Israel in 2009 following the occupation's brutal war against the Gaza Strip. This was followed by the permanent and official suspension of ties with the occupation in 2010 and the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador from Nouakchott.
Mauritanian political forces and organisations have voiced their refusal of the normalisation agreements signed between Arab countries and Israel under the sponsorship of US President Donald Trump, the latest of which was the peace accord concluded by Morocco and the occupation.
