Morocco cries victory. The UN report says “no progress”.
Fahd Al-Otaibi — Riyad, Arabie saoudite — 2026-10-05
Two capitals, one same document, and a report no one shows
On 4 October 2026, a Moroccan newspaper headlines: “Guterres enshrines the autonomy plan”.
The same day, an Algerian newspaper headlines: “The contradictions of the Moroccan discourse laid bare”.
Both are talking about the same document: the annual report of the Secretary-General of the United Nations on the situation concerning Western Sahara.
And both have a problem. We tried to read that report at the official source. We could not.
A report that two camps quote word for word, and that neither places before its readers' eyes: this is precisely the kind of file where you have to go and look for yourself.
What we tried, and what we obtained
The report bears the symbol S/2026/781. It is dated 1 October 2026.
We tried to download it from the official United Nations source, the document dissemination service.
Last year's report — S/2025/612 — downloads without difficulty: 18 pages, 585 849 bytes.
The new one, S/2026/781, returns only a generic page.
⚠️ And here is where we must be precise, because the obvious conclusion would be false.
We tested that same page with two symbols that do not exist — S/2026/999 and S/2099/1. It returns exactly the same response: 1 303 bytes, a loading page.
So “no PDF” does not prove that a document is unpublished: it proves only that this service does not give it to us.
What we can state, and nothing more: as of 4 October 2026, report S/2026/781 is not retrievable from the official United Nations document dissemination system. We cannot establish whether it is not yet published, or whether it is simply absent from this service.
We prefer to write that sentence, which is modest, rather than the one that would suit us, and which would be false.
The Algerian press, however, which says it holds a copy, itself affirms that this is “a preliminary version intended to inform the members of the Security Council before its official publication”. That is consistent — but it is not our verification, it is theirs, and we attribute it as such.
| What we checked | S/2025/612 | S/2026/781 |
|---|---|---|
| Symbol | previous annual report | current annual report |
| Date of the document | 30 September 2025 | 1 October 2026 |
| Official page at the UN | exists | exists |
| PDF file retrievable | yes — 18 pages, 585 849 bytes | no |
| Status as of 4 October 2026 | published, readable by all | not retrievable by us |
| Publicly cited by | the UN, the press | the Moroccan press and the Algerian press |
| Caveat | — | the same page returns an identical response for non-existent symbols |
Source: official United Nations document dissemination service (documents.un.org), consulted on 4 October 2026.
In other words: two capitals, two opposing narratives, and a document impossible for the reader to find — the reader of Morocco as much as the reader of Algeria.
The independent source, by contrast, is public
**There is an independent body that has been following the Security Council file by file for twenty years: the Security Council Report, in New York. Its monthly forecast for October 2026 was published on 1 October. It is public, downloadable and citable.**
Here is what it writes on the real state of the negotiations.
“Despite these meetings, no progress was made in reducing the differences between the parties.”
On the situation on the ground.
“The situation on the ground remains tense, marked by ongoing hostilities between Morocco and the Polisario Front.”
Then, on the consequences.
“The hostilities continued at a low to medium intensity […] but the absence of progress in the political process continues to generate instability and a risk of further escalation.”
Three sentences. None of them describes a “historic turning point”.
What happened on the ground while victory was being proclaimed
The same document, this one public, gives dates. Here they are, just as they are.
| Date | Fact |
|---|---|
| 5 May 2026 | Three rockets strike near the city of Smara — “close to the local prison and the cemetery” —, a civilian is wounded. The Polisario Front claims the attack. |
| 7 June 2026 | A Moroccan drone strike in the area of Mijek, east of the wall, kills the Polisario leader Lahbib Mohamed Abdelaziz and two other Polisario members. |
| 7-8 June 2026 | De Mistura travels to the Sahrawi refugee camps near Tindouf and meets Brahim Ghali, as well as women's, youth and human rights organisations. |
| 15 June 2026 | De Mistura meets the Algerian Minister of Foreign Affairs Ahmed Attaf, in Algiers. |
| 18 June 2026 | De Mistura meets the Mauritanian president Mohamed Ould Cheikh El Ghazouani, in Nouakchott. |
**Source: Security Council Report, Monthly Forecast — Western Sahara, October 2026, published on 1 October 2026.**
Rockets on a city. A drone that kills a leader. And a press release that speaks of a “historic turning point”.
And the review the Council had demanded is not finished
Let us recall what resolution 2797, adopted on 31 October 2025, demanded: the Secretary-General was to provide, within six months, a strategic review of the future of MINURSO, taking into account the outcome of the negotiations. Deadline: end of April 2026.
On 23 April 2026, in closed consultations, Asif Khan — director of the political affairs and mediation division at the UN department of political affairs — took stock.
**The Security Council Report writes this:**
“It was not yet finalised.”
And it sets out the options raised for reorienting MINURSO in the event of a political agreement — among them:
“supporting the exercise of the right to self-determination”
A “historic turning point” that leaves the door open to a mission one of whose options is to support self-determination is not a historic turning point. It is an open file.
And the Security Council is considering renewing for only six months
MINURSO's mandate expires on 31 October 2026.
Two options are on the table, according to the same independent source:
- renew for one year without changing anything, leaving more time to the political process;
- or renew for six months only — which “would create an earlier opportunity to assess whether the negotiations have advanced sufficiently”.
When a Security Council considers shortening a mandate rather than extending it, that is not the sign that a file is settled. It is the sign that it wants to be able to record a failure sooner.
What both camps say about the same document
The Moroccan reading. Le360, on 4 October 2026 at 17h16, under the byline of Tarik Qattab, headlines: “Guterres enshrines the autonomy plan”. The newspaper quotes the report, which calls on the parties to “engage in intense and good-faith negotiations” and to “consider the possibility of granting genuine autonomy, which could represent the most feasible outcome in accordance with resolution 2797 (2025)”.
That sentence, the Moroccan newspaper presents as “definitively enshrining the Moroccan plan as the one and only possible horizon of the Sahara conflict”.
**But Le360 itself reports the rest of the report, and that rest is less triumphant: the Secretary-General acknowledges there that this momentum “has at times been hampered by the continuation of military activities and a chronic lack of trust**”.
The Algerian reading. La Patrie News, on 4 October 2026, claims to hold a copy of the report and writes that it “delivers a stinging rebuttal to the narrative according to which Morocco has already obtained a definitive settlement”. According to that newspaper, the document establishes that the negotiation remains open, that the Moroccan project is not a final agreement, that a transitional arrangement is under discussion, and that the questions of sovereignty and of the right to self-determination remain among the most difficult to resolve.
L'Express Quotidien, the same day, cites ECSaharaui in turn and retains that the report does not enshrine the Moroccan plan as the exclusive solution: resolution 2797 is treated there as a “basis” for the discussions, which leaves the parties free to consider “other ideas, proposals and formulas”. The newspaper adds a point that deserves to be noted: the Moroccan delegation is said itself to have affirmed its willingness to work with the Polisario Front, the final result to be “drawn up and owned jointly by both parties”.
**And according to the Arabic daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi, the report would mention the creation of a “transitional council” responsible for joint management during the transition, and would recommend the extension of MINURSO by one year. The three rounds of negotiations — Washington, Miami, Madrid — are said to have covered very concrete subjects: natural resources (fishing, phosphates, minerals), disarmament, the composition of future security bodies, the modalities for electing representatives of the population, and the nature of the legal and administrative link between the territory and Rabat.**
So, who is right?
We cannot rule on the text of the report, because we cannot read it. And we will not pretend otherwise: that is exactly the kind of comfort we reproach in others.
But we can say three things, and they are verifiable by anyone.
First: we have not been able to read report S/2026/781. It is not retrievable from the UN document dissemination system, on this 4 October 2026. Neither we nor any reader can therefore verify the quotations circulating from it — including those we report here. We attribute them all, by name, to those who publish them.
Second: the independent body that follows the Security Council writes in black and white that there has been “no progress” and that hostilities continue. That directly contradicts the idea of a settled file.
Third: both camps quote the same sentence — the one about “genuine autonomy as the most feasible outcome”. That sentence takes up the preamble of resolution 2797, adopted in 2025. It is not new. To present it as an enshrinement is to confuse a repetition with a decision.
What is at stake on 31 October 2026
On 31 October 2026, the Security Council will vote on the future of MINURSO.
If it renews for one year, the negotiations continue. If it renews for six months only, it is because it considers that nothing is moving forward.
In either case, on that day, no one will be able to speak of a historic turning point any more.
What we know, tonight, comes down to one sentence: two capitals are claiming victory or denouncing a stripping bare, over a report their readers cannot open. We tried to open it. We have said precisely where that stops.
Sources: United Nations, report of the Secretary-General on the situation concerning Western Sahara, symbol S/2026/781, dated 1 October 2026 — document not consulted by us as of 4 October 2026; we do not conclude that it is unpublished; the previous year's report S/2025/612, of 30 September 2025, published and downloadable (585 849 bytes, 18 pages). — Security Council Report, Monthly Forecast — Western Sahara, October 2026, published on 1 October 2026. — Le360 (Morocco), “الصحراء: غوتيريش يكرس مخطط الحكم الذاتي”, Tarik Qattab, 4 October 2026. — La Patrie News (Algeria), “Rapport du SG de l'ONU sur le Sahara Occidental : les contradictions du discours marocain mises à nu”, 4 October 2026. — L'Express Quotidien (Algeria), “Le récit triomphaliste de Rabat se fissure”, 4 October 2026. — Al-Quds Al-Arabi, “تقرير غوتيريش حول الصحراء: مجلس انتقالي وتمديد المينورسو”, 4 October 2026. — Resolution 2797 (2025) of the Security Council, adopted on 31 October 2025. — Global Peace Index 2026, Institute for Economics and Peace.