In a statement to the press, Ross thanked HM King Mohammed VI for the audience the sovereign granted him on Monday at the Casablanca royal palace.
 
    He also thanked the Foreign and Interior ministers "for the useful meetings we had yesterday and today in Rabat."

    "My visit to Morocco is part of my fourth tour of the region within the framework of the mission I was assigned by the UNSG," Ross said, noting that this tour is meant to prepare for the third informal meeting slated in November.

    "This meeting will be held between the Kingdom of Morocco and the Polisario Front in the presence of two neighboring countries, Algeria and Mauritania, to reach a just, lasting and agreed political settlement between the two parties, securing for the Western Sahara's people the right to self-determination, with the support of the countries of the region, notably the two neighboring countries," he added.
  
    In this regard, Ross underlined that "the officials expressed, during the four legs of the tour (Algiers, Tindouf region, Nouakchott and the Kingdom of Morocco) their full readiness to back my efforts and those of the UN in general."

    He said that the talks in Morocco "touched on the political situation of the whole region."

    "We have also discussed the need to overcome the current situation, the methods of the negotiation process and the procedure of management of trust-building measures," he said.
 
    The UN official added that the talks turned also on "the pressing need to ease the prevailing tension and avoid all that could spoil the climate or hinder progress at the upcoming round of negotiations which, I hope, will enable to open the way for tangible steps towards the expected settlement."