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The Occupation We Choose to Ignore’

Do you know who I am? I am a Sahrawi. The land to which I refer is what is known today as the non-self-governing territory ofWestern Sahara. My country was colonized by the Spanish and the French between 1884 and 1975, divided in two and occupied by Moroccan and Mauritanian forces thereafter, and has been ruled exclusively by the Kingdom of Morocco from 1979 until the present.

The Western Sahara: forgotten first source of the Arab Spring

this is one part of the Arab Spring that western governments don't want to talk about. And their silence, and the UN's complicity in it, is why that repression continues, and a terrible injustice is perpetuated.

ISS - News - The Western Sahara and North African People’s Power

Respect the right of individuals to peacefully express their opinions regarding the status and future of the Western Sahara and to document violations of human rights

King of Morocco to be biggest benefactor of EU trade agreement - Telegraph

it has emerged that the single biggest beneficiary of the deal will be the King of Morocco, who is head of one of the three largest agricultural producers in the north African country and lays claim to 12,000 hectares of the nation's most fertile farmland.

North African Dispatches Africa’s Forgotten Colony

Oblivion it seems is the current reality for the arid North African territory of Western Sahara; often referred to as Africa’s ‘Last Colony’. In my opinion, it would be more accurate to describe it as ‘Africa’s Forgotten Colony’.

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Oct 26, 2010

Youth killed by morocco


RABAT — A youth was killed and five people were wounded by Moroccan police when they tried to gain access to a camp near Laayoune in Western Sahara, a source close to local authorities said. The source said a clash had broken out between a group of youths and the police who had "opened fire and killed a 14-year-old." The wounded were taken to a military hospital in Laayoune. More than 5,000 residents of Laayoune set up tents October 19 seven kilometres (four miles) outside the town in the direction of Smara to protest against social conditions in the former Spanish colony. Several witnesses said the number of protesters had grown to over 10,000. The youths "were in two cars. A bullet was fired from one of the vehicles, which forced the security forces to riposte," the interior ministry said in a statement. "One person was killed and three others were wounded in the exchange of fire," the statement added. "The prosecutor's office of the Laayoune appeal court has ordered a judicial inquiry." The incident occurred just after a brief visit to Morocco by the UN special envoy for the Western Sahara, Christopher Ross, who had arrived Friday in hope of reviving talks between the kingdom and the Polisario Front separatist movement, officials said. Ross arrived in Casablanca from the Mauritanian capital Nouakchott, as part of a tour of the region that has already taken him to Algeria, which backs the Polisario Front's claim to the Moroccan-occupied Western Sahara. A former Spanish colony, Western Sahara was annexed by Morocco after settlers withdrew in 1975. The north African kingdom stakes a historical claim to the territory, which Polisario violently opposed until the United Nations brokered a ceasefire in 1991. Polisario wants a UN-organised referendum that would give the Sahrawi people three choices: attachment to Morocco, independence or autonomy under Moroccan sovereignty. Morocco backs the option of broad autonomy for the territory, but rejects any notion of independence for Western Sahara. .