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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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Apr 3, 2012

Danish government zigzagging over Western Sahara | Newstime Africa

Written by Peter Kenworthy on April 2, 2012.
Saved under Latest, World News
Tags: Danish government, Pia Olsen Dyhr, Western Sahara

Western Sahara - Credit Lailab

Danish Minister for Trade and Investment, Pia Olsen Dyhr, says that Denmark will not support or subsidize Danish companies that operate illegally in Western Sahara. A month ago, the Minister was rather less adamant when replying to a letter from Danish solidarity movement, Africa Contact. “The government will not oppose Danish companies operating in areas such as Western Sahara, but the External Action Service is reluctant to actively support such activities.”

In a response to the Danish Committee on Foreign Affairs in March, however, Pia Olsen Dyhr now says that “the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has no tax-financed programmes or undertakings that seek to promote Danish business interests in Western Sahara, nor does the Ministry have any plans of such undertakings. Based on a concrete enquiry by the Danish Export Credit Agency (EKF), concerning whether EKF could risk assess Danish investments in Western Sahara, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs discouraged EKF from working in areas, such as Western Sahara, where the question of sovereignty is presently unresolved.”

All trade in resources from occupied areas such as Western Sahara, colonised by Morocco since 1975, is illegal under international law (e.g. the UN Convention on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights §1,2) unless the indigenous inhabitants of Western Sahara, the Saharawis, agree to and benefit from such trade.

According to the Saharawis themselves – those from the occupied territories as well as the more than 150.000 Saharawis living in refugee camps in the Algerian dessert – they have neither been asked nor do they benefit from Moroccos selling of their phosphate and fishing quotas, something that is confirmed by Abba Malainin from the Saharawi liberation front, Polisario. “The Saharawis have not been consulted,” he tells Africa Contact.

These claims are supported by a secret statement from the European Parliament’s Legal Service from 2009, which therefore concludes that the much debated fisheries agreement between the EU and Morocco, that allows the EU’s fishing fleet to fish of the shores of Western Sahara, is illegal under present circumstances.

Africa's last colony -Western Sahara

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