Portal:Western Sahara

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The Western Sahara Portal

Western Sahara is the name of a disputed region in northwest Africa. The legal status of the territory and the issue of sovereignty are unresolved; the territory is contested by Morocco and the Polisario Front (Popular Front for the Liberation of the Saguia el Hamra and Rio de Oro), which in February 1976 formally formed a government-in-exile of what it refers to as the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR). The Polisario views the SADR as incorporating the entire territory of Western Sahara, referring to the region controlled by Morocco as the "Occupied Territories" and the remainder, which it controls, as the free zone. Morocco also claims the entire territory, which it refers to as its "Southern Provinces". The Moroccan government refers to the Polisario controlled regions as its "buffer zone", claiming these regions as part of Moroccan territory. On the ground the Moroccan and Polisario controlled zones are physically separated by a series of defensive works constructed by the Moroccan armed forces and manned by an estimate 160,000 Moroccan troops. It is estimated that several thousand Polisario troops are present in the Polisario controlled areas at any given time, which they regularly patrol. The government-in-exile of the self-proclaimed SADR is headquartered in the Sahrawi refugee camps in the vicinity of the town of TIndouf in Algeria, situated close to the Algeria-Western Sahara border.

Western Sahara was appropriated by Spain at the Berlin Conference in 1884 along with other provinces that were returned to Morocco (Sidi Ifni and Tarfaya). After the colonial era the Polisario Front has fought guerrilla war against Morocco, and Mauritania for independence of Western Sahara. The war ended in a 1991 UN-brokered cease-fire; a UN-organized referendum on final status has been repeatedly postponed. Today, 43 governments, mainly from Africa and Latin America, recognize the SADR as the legitimate government in Western Sahara. It is a member of the African Union, but not the United Nations nor the Arab League. Morocco is considered by the UN and many other countries as the administrative power of Western Sahara, though they don't recognize its sovereignty over it. Several thousand Sahrawis live in refugee camps in Tindouf, Algeria.

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The history of Western Sahara took a new turn in the 14th century, when Arab tribes, the Beni Hassan, first travelled to this region. The society of the Western Sahara survived the invasion. Both Berber and Arab features persist today. The region was still largely organised in tribes when the Spanish arrived in Río de Oro in the late 19th century. Resistance was organised by Morocco and led by the caid of sultan Hassan I Ma al-'Aynayn, but the territory would be cut off from Morocco by Spain and France for colonization at the Berlin Conference in 1884.

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A NASA photo of the main city of Western Sahara, El Aaiún, taken from outer space.
A NASA photo of the main city of Western Sahara, El Aaiún, taken from outer space.


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El-Ouali Mustapha Sayed (c. 1950-1976) was the founder of the Polisario Front, an organisation that fights for the independence of Western Sahara. Born in a simple family, Mustapha became interested in the politics of Western Sahara when he met other Sahrawi students at law school in Morocco. El-ouali became a member of the communist party of Morocco and received a military training in Gadaffi's Libya. He then organized the Polisario as the "Embryonic Movement for the Liberation of Saguia el-Hamra and Río de Oro" in 1971. In addition to being the Secretary-General of the Polisario, he became the first President of Western Sahara in 1976. On June 9 of that year, he was killed in combat, fighting in Nouakchott, Mauretania.

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