SAWT BEIRUT INTERNATIONAL

| 29 March 2024, Friday |

Spanish Court opens probe into ex-minister’s role in Polisario leader hospitalization

On Monday, a court in Zaragoza launched a formal inquiry into former Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez Laya’s participation in the April admittance of Western Sahara’s leader, Brahim Ghali, to a Spanish hospital.

According to a spokesperson for the Zaragoza tribunal, an investigative magistrate will look into whether anything illegal occurred when the leader of the Polisario Front independence movement was allowed into Spain from Algeria, where he lives, and when he was admitted to hospital in the city of Logrono.

Gonzalez Laya will be interrogated as part of the investigation, she added. A former top aide is also under investigation.

Gonzalez Laya did not return a message seeking comment. At the time she had said Ghali was allowed to fly to Spain on humanitarian grounds and that the decision was lawful.

Ghali landed at the Spanish air force base in Zaragoza while suffering a severe case of COVID-19 in April and was hospitalized in Logrono. He returned to Algeria almost two months later.

Ghali’s presence in Spain infuriated Morocco, which appeared briefly to relax border controls with the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in May, resulting in a sudden influx of migrants to the Spanish autonomous city.

The Algeria-backed Polisario Front is fighting for the independence of Western Sahara, a Spanish colony until the mid-1970s that is claimed by Morocco.

    Source:
  • Reuters