“Dakhla is not just a beautiful location with cinematic sand dunes. Primarily, it is an occupied, militarised city whose indigenous Sahrawi population is subject to brutal repression by occupying Moroccan forces”, said the Western Sahara International Film Festival, whose editions take place in the Sahrawi refugee camps in Algeria.
Joining Sahrawi and international human rights activists calling for director Christopher Nolan to suspend production of his much-awaited film The Odyssey in the city of Dakhla, in the Morocco-occupied Western Sahara, FiSahara issued an urgent plea to Nolan and his team, including film stars Matt Damon and Zendaya, to “stop filming in Dakhla and stand in solidarity with the indigenous Sahrawis who have been under military occupation for 50 years, and who are routinely jailed and tortured for their peaceful struggle for self-determination”.
Nolan, Zendaya and Damon were spotted upon their arrival in Dakhla around July 17, with pro-régime media celebrating that they were in “Morocco’s southern provinces”. However, Western Sahara is listed as a “non self-governed territory” by the United Nations, is under Moroccan occupation and has yet to undergo full decolonisation.
“By filming part of The Odyssey in an occupied territory billed as a ‘news black hole’ by Reporters without Borders, Nolan and his team, perhaps unknowingly and unwillingly, are contributing to the repression of the Sahrawi people by Morocco, and to the Moroccan regime’s efforts to normalise its occupation of Western Sahara”, said FiSahara Executive Director María Carrión.
“We are sure that were they to understand the full implications of filming such as high-profile film in a territory whose indigenous peoples are unable to make their own films about their stories under occupation, Nolan and his team would be horrified”, stated the festival.
“Morocco routinely touts Sahrawi cultural expressions as uniquely Moroccan. They created a film festival in Dakhla to counter ours, and produce high budget films that portray Western Sahara as part of Morocco. However, Sahrawis trying to make films about their lives are persecuted and must work clandestinely and at great risk to themselves and their families. One example is the documentary Three Stolen Cameras by Equipe Media, one of many media and human rights collectives banned by Morocco. We encourage Nolan to watch this film, as well as Four Days in Western Sahara: Africa’s Last Colony by Democracy Now!”
FiSahara, a member of the Human Rights Film Network which has welcomed to its 18 editions numerous film stars like Javier Bardem, human rights defenders such as the former President of the Center for Constitutional Rights Michael Ratner and many others, is held in the Sahrawi refugee camps in Algeria, where thousands of indigenous Sahrawis fled in 1975-76 following Morocco’s brutal invasion of Western Sahara. In 1991, after a 16-year war between the Moroccan military and the Sahrawi liberation movement known as the Polisario Front, a UN-brokered ceasefire promised Sahrawis a referendum on self-determination, which Morocco has prevented from taking place ever since.
Sahrawis who remain in the occupied territory face arbitrary detention, disappearances, torture, sexual and gender-based violence and many other human rights violations. Sahrawi human rights defenders, journalists, and climate justice and land rights activists are routinely persecuted for reporting on these violations. International media and human rights monitors, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, are barred by Morocco from entering the territory.
“Morocco only allows entry into occupied Western Sahara to those who fit into its strategy to sell its occupation to the outside world”, said Carrión. “Tourists who go to Morocco-built and owned resorts to kite surf, companies willing to participate in its plunder of natural resources, journalists willing to toe its line, and high profile visitors such as Nolan and his team who help Morocco sell the story that Western Sahara is part of Morocco, and that Sahrawis are content to live under its rule, are given red carpet treatment. But ask organisations like Amnesty International, UN human rights chief Volker Turk or the hundreds of journalists and observers who are either prevented or deported from the territory, and they will tell a different story”.
