A SCHEME by a United Nations envoy to divide Western Sahara is a “non-starter, the Polisario Front said on Thursday.

The UN envoy to Western Sahara, Staffan de Mistura, put forward a proposal to divide the territory between Morocco and the pro-independence Polisario Front as a way to settle the decades-long conflict.

Mr Mistura proposed partition as one potential way to satisfy both sides and give residents a chance to decide under who they want to live, according to a briefing provided to a closed meeting of the UN security council on Wednesday.

“Such an option could allow for the creation on the one hand of an independent state in the southern part, and on the other hand the integration of the rest of the territory as part of Morocco, with its sovereignty over it internationally recognised,” he said.

The idea of partition isn’t new. In a never-enacted agreement, Mauritania ceded the southern part of Western Sahara to Polisario when it withdrew in 1979. Former envoy James Baker floated partition more than two decades ago.

But Polisario said in a statement on Thursday that it told Mr Mistura in an October 3 meeting that any compromise that disregarded international law or was “contrary to the mandate of the UN’s Mission for the referendum” was a non-starter.

Morocco’s Foreign Ministry has made no comment.