Africa Center Director J. Peter Pham is quoted by Foreign Policy on extremism in the Western Sahara:
In refugee crisis situations, it isn’t uncommon for food assistance to be used by a wider population than is intended — and it isn’t always possible for the U.N. to monitor where all of its donated commodities are being distributed all of the time. But the longevity and orderliness of the Sahrawi arrangement makes it unprecedented. It’s likely that news of U.S.-funded food assistance going directly to the Polisario army has the potential to enrage Morocco and launch a serious diplomatic impasse for the United States, according to J. Peter Pham, director of the Africa Center at the Atlantic Council.
“The U.S. needs to assert better control of its aid,” says Pham. “No one has an accurate count or knowledge on something we have been paying on the blind for years. What is happening [in the SADR] is unconscionable and could lead to a political crisis.”