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Western Sahara

Official language

Arabic

Largest city

Laâyoune - Moroccan translitteration (El Aaiún, al-'uyun)

Area
- Total
- % water

266,000 km²
Negligible

Population
- Total
- Density

267,405 (July 2004 est.)
1/km²

Independence
- Declared
- Claimed and controlled

From Spain
February 27, 1976
By Morocco

Currency

Moroccan Dirham (MAD)

Time zone

UTC 0

Calling Code

+ 212 (same code as Morocco)

Western Sahara (EH in ISO 3166-1) is a territory of northwestern Africa, bordered by Morocco (or by north of morocco) on the north, Algeria on the northeast, Mauritania to the east and south, and the Atlantic Ocean on the west. The largest city is El Aaiún (Laayoune), containing the majority of the population of the territory.

Whether it is an integral part of the Kingdom of Morocco or is governed by the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), set up by the movement Polisario Front, is disputed. At present it is largely controlled and entirely claimed by Morocco. The SADR is recognized by 54 nations, and a full member of the African Union. Western Sahara is on the United Nations list of Non-Self-Governing Territories. Since 1989, 24 nations cancelled their recognition of SADR.

Western Sahara is the most sparsely populated territory in the world.

History

Main article: History of Western Sahara

Spain created the colony of Spanish Sahara through successive treaties and agreements with local populations and France during the first two decades of the 20th century. Due to internal pressures following the death of Francisco Franco in 1975, and the global trend in decolonization, Spain planned to divest itself of the Sahara, and promised a referendum regarding independence. On November 6, 1975 the Green March into Western Sahara began when 300,000 unarmed Moroccans converged on the city of Tarfaya in southern Morocco and waited for a signal from King Hassan II of Morocco to cross into Western Sahara. As a result, Spain abandoned Western Sahara on November 14, 1975, repatriating even the Spanish corpses from its cemeteries. Morocco then virtually annexed the northern two-thirds of Western Sahara (formerly Spanish Sahara) in 1976. In 1979, following Mauritania's withdrawal, Morocco extended its control to the rest of the territory. A guerrilla war carried by the Polisario Front contesting Rabat's sovereignty ended in a 1991 cease-fire by United Nations peacekeeping mission MINURSO.

The referendum, originally scheduled for 1992, was planned to give the indigenous population the option between independence or inclusion to Morocco, but has not taken place as of 2005. At the heart of the dispute lays the question of who can be registered as an indigenous voter. In 1997, the Houston Agreement made another attempt to implement the referendum, but failed.

Both sides blame each other for the stalling of the referendum, but it is obvious that Morocco, as the current de facto power in much of the territory, stood only to lose. Indeed, shortly after the Houston Agreement, the kingdom officially declared including an option of independence on the referendum ballot was "no longer necessary". Erik Jensen, who played an administrative role in MINURSO, wrote that neither side would agree to a voter registration in which they were destined to lose (see Western Sahara: Anatomy of a Stalemate)

A United States-backed document known as the "James Baker peace plan" was discussed by the United Nations Security Council in 2000, and envisioned a future Western Sahara Authority (WSA), to be followed after five years by the referendum. It was rejected by both sides, although initially spawned from a Moroccan proposal and exhibiting a stark pro-Moroccan bias in comparison to the agreed-upon 1991 plan. According to Baker's draft, Moroccan settlers would be granted the vote in the Sahrawi independence referendum, and the ballot would be split three-ways by the inclusion of an unspecified "autonomy", further undermining the independece camp. Also, Morocco was allowed to keep its army in the area and to retain the control over all security issues during both the autonomy years and the election. In 2003 however, after some additions spelled out the powers of the WSA, making it less reliant on the Moroccan devolution. It also provided further detail on the referendum process in order to make it harder to stall or subvert. The plan's second draft, commonly known as Baker II, was counterintuitively accepted by the Polisario as a "basis of negotiations". This contradicts the Polisario's policy of only negotiating with the standards of voter identification from 1991. After that, it quickly garnered widespread international support, culminating in the UN Security Council's unanimous endorsement of the plan in the summer of 2003.

Today, however, the Baker II document appears politically dead, having led nowhere, and with Baker having resigned his post at the UN in 2004. His resignation followed several months of failed attempts to get Morocco to at least enter into formal negotiations on the plan, but he met with complete rejection. The new king, Mohammed VI of Morocco, opposes the concept of a referendum on indpendence, and has said Morocco will never agree to one. His father, Hassan II of Morocco, initially supported the idea in principle in 1982, and in signed contracts in 1991 and 1997.

The UN has put forth no replacement strategy after the breakdown of Baker II, and renewed fighting is a possibility. In 2005, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan reported increased military activity on both sides of the front and breaches of several cease-fire provisions against strengthening military fortifications.

Morocco, resistant to the UN process, has repeatedly tried to replace it with bilateral negotiations with Algeria, receiving vocal support from France and occasionally and currently from the United States. These negotiations would define the exact limits of a Western Sahara autonomy under Moroccan rule, but only after Morocco's "inalienable right" to the territory was recognized as a precondition to the talks. The Algerian government has consistently refused, claiming it has neither the will nor the right to negotiate on the behalf of the Polisario Front.

Politics

Main articles: Politics of Western Sahara

The legal status of the territory and the question of its sovereignty is unresolved; the territory is contested by Morocco and Polisario Front. The government of Morocco is a monarchy, with a parliament of elected officials. The government of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic is a single-party parliamentary and presidential system, not unlike Germany.

Subdivisions

Currently, Western Sahara is largely administered by Morocco. The extent of Morocco's administration is north and west of the Moroccan Wall (or berm), approximately two-thirds of the territory. The Moroccan name for Western Sahara is the "Southern Provinces", which indicate Río de Oro and Saguia el-Hamra. The remaining area is administered by the SADR. When the territory was a dependency of Spain, the same two subdivisions existed.

Geography

Main article: Geography of Western Sahara

Western Sahara is located in Northern Africa, bordering the North Atlantic Ocean, between Mauritania and Morocco (or north of Morocco). It also borders Algeria to the northeast. The land is some of the most arid and inhospitable on the planet, but is rich in phosphates in Bou Craa.

Economy

Main article: Economy of Western Sahara

Western Sahara has few natural resources and lacks sufficient rainfall for most agricultural activities. Its economy is centred around nomadic herding, fishing, and phosphate mining. Most food for the urban population must be imported. All trade and other economic activities are controlled by the Moroccan government. The government has encouraged citizens to relocate to the territory by giving subsidies and price controls on basic goods. The refugee camps in Tindouf, Algeria, are wholly reliant on foreign and Algerian aid. Food, clothing and even water are brought in by car and plane. Since the nineties a rudimentary monetary economy has evolved in the camps, after Spain started paying pensions to former recruited Sahrawi soldiers in its colonial army, and with money and merchandise brought in by Sahrawis working or studying abroad. A minor but significant addition comes from those Sahrawis pursuing traditional nomadic camel-herding in the Polisario-controlled parts of Western Sahara and in Mauretania.

Demographics

Main article: Demographics of Western Sahara

As of July 2004, an estimated 267,405 people live in the territory of Western Sahara. The precise size of the native population versus Moroccan settlers is not known. Indigenous Western Saharans, often called Sahrawis, speak a dialect called Hassaniya Arabic, also spoken in Mauritania. The main religion is Islam.

See the CIA World Factbook 2004

Culture

Main article: Culture of Western Sahara

The indigenous people of Western Sahara are the Sahrawis, a nomadic or Bedouin people who speak the Ḥassānīya dialect of Arabic, also spoken in northern Mauritania. They are of mixed Arab-Berber descent, but consider themselves Arab. It is theorized that they descend from the Beni Hassan, a Yemeni tribe supposed to have migrated across the desert in the 11th century.

The Sahrawis are Muslims of the Sunni sect and the Maliki law school. Their interpretation of Islam has traditionally being quite liberal and adapted to nomad life (i.e. generally functioning without mosques).

The originally clan- and tribe-based society underwent a massive social upheaval in 1975, when a part of the population was forced into exile and settled in the refugee camps of Tindouf, Algeria. Families were broken up by the fight. The organization governing the camps, the Polisario Front, has attempted to modernize the camps society, placing emphasis especially on education, the eradication of tribalism and the emancipation of women. The role of women in camps was enhanced by their shouldering of the main responsibility for the refugee camps and government bureaucracy during the war years, as virtually the entire male population was enrolled in the Polisario army.

Education was also assisted by refugee life. While teaching materials are still scarce, the "urbanization" of the refugee camps and the abundance of free time for camp dwellers (after the situation normalized circa 1977) greatly increased the effectiveness of literacy classes. Today, nearly 90% of refugee Sahrawis are able to read and write, the number having been less than 10% in 1975, and several thousands have reveived university educations in foreign countries as part of aid packages (mainly Algeria, Cuba, and Spain).

To date, there have been few thorough studies of the culture due in part to the political situation. Some language and culture studies, mainly by French researchers, have been performed on Sahrawi communities in northern Mauritania.

External links

News

France	Îles Éparses
United Kingdom	Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha

African territories
fully part of
non-African states

France	Mayotte Réunion
Italy	Pantelleria Pelagie Islands
Portugal	Madeira Savage Islands
Spain	Canary Islands Ceuta Melilla Plazas de soberanía
Yemen	Socotra