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| WESTERN SAHARA |
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| AFRICA |
BACKGROUND :
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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MAP OF MAURITANIA
AFRICA |
BACKGROUND :
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.
MAURITANIA
Oh What a lovely place! 90% is Sahara Desert, it is an "Islamic Republic", 4% of the population are formally slaves, Female genital mutilation is practised and child labor is the norm. Where else would you want to live?
Now i wrote the foregoing about three weeks ago. And it is true that other things have intruded, but , if I am totally honest I would have to admit that The information summarised in the above paragraph really put me off writing about Mauretania. But I can't spend the rest of my days peering over the border into wretched Mauretania - no, I shall have to mentally go on in!
Bounded by Western Sahara and Algeria in the North, Mali in the East, and South and also by Senegal in the South , Mauritania has for its Western border the Atlantic Ocean.
The country is an Islamic Republic with a population of approx. 3,500,000 including as we have said 140,000 official slaves - 4% of the population. Languages used include Arabic, French and a version of +Berber.+ The Motto of the country is : " Honor, Fraternity , Justice" - slaves are exempted from these tiresome privileges , as are genitally-mutilated women and child laborers.
The name Mauritania has its origins in the ancient Roman Province of Mauretania Tingitana which occupied most of present day Morocco and survived as a Berber Kingdom until the 7th Century A.D. From around A..D.1000 Arab invaders maintained continual pressure on the country and finally in a thirty years war from 1644 to 1674 Yemeni Arabs crushed the Berber peoples and assumed control. However in the late 19th Century, French forces from Senegal in the South integrated Mauritania into French territory. French rule brought an end to historic legal slavery in the country. But in 1960 the country was again given its independence.Slavery was restored. Its victims are largely sub-Saharan Africans.
Severe drought in the 1970s- even by Mauritanian standards led to immense civil unrest.As many as 70,000 sub-Saharan African Mauritanians were expelled from the country at the time. A bloodless coup took place in July , 1978 .This has opened the way for a long period of internal instability with coups and counter coups becoming the routine way of life. Slavery has been banned and then re-introduced.
The last of the coups was in 2008, but the political climate remains unhealthy despite elections held.
Now I know where Mauritania is ...but I feel none the better for it!
