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| WESTERN SAHARA |
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| AFRICA |
Africa covers 6 per cent of the surface of the Earth and provides 20.4 per cent of Earth’s landmass. Occupying this massive and significant territory there are 1.1 Billion people. Africa is the second largest and second most populous continent on Earth.
WESTERN SAHARA
Western Sahara has the Atlantic Ocean for its Western border, on its Northern border is Morocco, the North-Eastern border is shared with Algeria and the Eastern and Southern borders are shared with Mauritania.
The territory of Western Sahara is disputed.It had been a Spanish territory until 1975 when a United Nations resolution requested that the Spanish hold a referendum on self-determination. One year earlier the U.N. had asked Spain to de-colonise the territory.
Spain surrendered control of the territory to a joint administration of Morocco and Mauritania and this shortly led to a war betwen those countries and a local liberation movement - the Polisario Front (strongly backed by Algeria). Mauritania withdrew in 1979 and Morocco secured complete control.
In 1991 the U.N. sponsored a ceasefire giving 2/3rds of the country including the Atlantic Coast to Morocco and the remainder to SADR the organisation behind the Polisario Front.
The history of the region is not rich. It was originally Berber territory, which became Mohammedanised in the 8th Century A.D. By the early 1700s Spain had established her influence by developing a commercial fishing industry off the coast. After the Berlin Conference of 1884, Spain had claimed Western Sahara as hers.
The population is not large ,estimated at around 513,000 40% of whom live in one coastal city - Laayoune ( or El Aaiun). Commercial efforts to explore for oil and to further develop fishing have come unstuck on international legal issues related to the country's legal status.
In short Western Sahara is a good place to be (away) from.
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