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For the Baker Plan instituted to ease Third World Debt see Baker Plan (debt relief).

The Baker Plan (formal name, Peace Plan for Self-Determination of the People of Western Sahara) is a United Nations initiative to grant Western Sahara self-determination. It was intended to substitute the Settlement Plan of 1991, which had been further detailed in the Houston Agreement of 1997.

Western Sahara's administration by Morocco since 1975 is challenged by Polisario guerillas living in exile in neighbouring Algeria. Since 1991 a cease-fire is in place, accepted by both parties under the assumption that the UN would organize a referendum on independence. The 1991 referendum plan was however stalled due to disagreements on voter eligibility (Morocco demanding the inclusion of all people now living in the territory, while the Polisario front insisted on including only those found in the last Spanish census, from 1974, and their descendants) and by the late nineties Morocco was openly declaring the referendum a "dead option".

The first version of the plan, called Baker I or the Framework Agreement, was delivered by UN special envoy James Baker in 2000. It was meant to give the people of Western Sahara self-determination through a large autonomy within the Moroccan state. Except for defense and foreign policy, all other capacities would be in the responsibility of a local government. Morocco accepted the plan while Algeria and the Polisario front rejected it. Algeria even countered by proposing that the territory be divided between the parties [1].

The second version (Baker II) was aimed at instituting Saharan self-rule in a "Western Sahara Authority" for a period of five years, whereafter the referendum is to be held, with all the population of Western Sahara allowed to vote. The provision that the "Western Sahara Authority" would be elected only by a restricted voters' list alienated Morocco. After initial hesitations, Algeria and the Polisario accepted the plan, especially after Morocco rejected it. The UN Security Council then endorsed the plan in July 2003, which it had not done with Baker's first draft, and unanimously called on the parties to implement it.

The rejection of the Baker II plan by Morocco and the Baker I plan by Algeria and the Polisario front, prompted Baker to resign, the second UN envoy to Western Sahara to do so, claiming there was no longer any feasible way to implement the peace agreement provisions. He has since then stated that Morocco showed no interest in implementing the UN decisions and will not do so if it stands a chance to lose in the referendum.^{[citation needed]}

The Western Sahara Authority (WSA) would have been the theoretical governing body for the territory of Western Sahara. Under James Baker III's 2003 Peace Plan, the WSA would dismantle the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) as an aspirant sovereign entity over the region, and replace it with an autonomous body under Moroccan sovereignty during a five-year transitional period.

After this time, the Saharan population, including both native Sahrawis, Tindouf refugees, Sahrawis from Southern Morocco and other Moroccans, would hold a referendum on independence: if they voted in favor, the WSA would be dismantled, and the SADR would take its place as an internationally-recognized sovereign entity. If they voted for integration, either the WSA would continue to administer the territory, or it would be fully integrated into the other Moroccan provinces.

Since early 2005, the UN Secretary General stopped referring to the plan in his reports, and by now it seems largely dead. No replacement plan exists, however, and worries persist that the political vacuum will result in renewed fighting. Morocco has proposed autonomy for the territory as a final solution to the conflict.

• Jacob Mundy "Seized of the Matter". The UN and the Western Sahara Dispute (PDF)
• MERIP: Toby Shelley Behind the Baker Plan for Western Sahara
• The United Nations and Western Sahara: A Never-ending Affair U.S. Institute of Peace Report, July 2006