U.S. President Donald Trump’s senior adviser for Arab and African affairs, Massad Boulos, met a senior French foreign ministry official for talks on the Sahara, Sudan and Libya.
Boulos said he met Romaric Roignan, director for North Africa and the Middle East at the French foreign ministry, to discuss “areas of cooperation and mutual interest” between Washington and Paris in the Near East and Africa.
On the Sahara, Boulos said the two sides emphasized the need to pursue a peaceful, durable and mutually acceptable resolution in line with UN Security Council Resolution 2797. The position keeps Washington and Paris aligned around the diplomatic track that has increasingly treated Morocco’s autonomy proposal as the central basis for negotiations.
The meeting comes after UN and U.S. officials held a third co-chaired interministerial meeting on the Sahara in Washington in February. UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said those talks were held in close partnership with the United States, the Security Council penholder on the Sahara, and included discussions taking Morocco’s autonomy proposal as a basis.
Morocco proposes autonomy for the Sahara under its sovereignty. The Polisario Front, backed by Algeria, seeks a referendum on self-determination. The dispute dates back to 1975, after Spain ended its colonial rule over the territory, and has remained under UN mediation since a 1991 ceasefire.
The U.S.-French talks also covered Libya, where Boulos said the two sides discussed support for an inclusive, Libyan-led political process to unify the country’s institutions in line with the UN political roadmap.
On Sudan, Boulos said Washington and Paris stressed coordination around the Berlin Conference and a joint statement of principles backed by both countries and 20 other states and organizations.
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The talks add to a series of recent diplomatic moves around the Sahara file, including French engagement with UN monitoring efforts in Laayoune and continued U.S. backing for Morocco’s autonomy proposal within the UN-led process.
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