Editing History of Western Sahara (section)

==Armed conflict (1975–1991)==
{{main|Western Sahara War}}
In late 1975, Spain held meetings with Polisario leader [[El-Ouali Mustapha Sayed|El-Ouali]], to negotiate the terms for a handover of power. But at the same time, [[Morocco]] and [[Mauritania]] began to put pressure on the Franco government: both countries argued that [[Spanish Sahara]] formed a historical part of their own territories. The United Nations became involved after Morocco asked for an opinion on the legality of its demands from the [[International Court of Justice]] (ICJ), and the UN also sent a [[UN visiting mission to Spanish Sahara|visiting mission]] to examine the wishes of the population. The visiting mission returned its report on October 15, announcing "an overwhelming consensus" in favor of [[independence]]<ref>{{Cite book|author=Davidson, Basil |title=Let freedom come: Africa in modern history|date=1978|publisher=Little, Brown|isbn=0-316-17435-1|oclc=3843563}}</ref> (as opposed to integration with Morocco or with Mauritania, or continued rule by Spain). The mission, headed by [[Simeon Aké]], also declared that the Polisario Front seemed the main Sahrawi organization of the territory - the only rival arrangements to what the mission described as Polisario's "mass demonstrations" came from the [[Partido de Unión Nacional Saharaui|PUNS]], which by this time also advocated independence. Polisario then made further diplomatic gains by ensuring the backing of the main Sahrawi tribes and of a number of formerly pro-Spanish [[Djema'a]] elders at the [[Ain Ben Tili]] conference of October 12.

On October 16, the ICJ delivered [[International Court of Justice Advisory Opinion on Western Sahara|its verdict]]. To the dismay of both the [[Rabat]] and [[Nouakchott]] governments, the court found with a clear majority, that the historical ties of these countries to Spanish Sahara did ''not'' grant them the right to the territory. Furthermore, the Court declared that the concept of ''[[terra nullius]]'' (un-owned land) did not apply to the territory. The Court declared that the Sahrawi population, as the true owners of the land, held a right of [[self-determination]]. In other words, any proposed solution to the situation (independence, integration etc.), had to receive the explicit acceptance of the population to gain any legal standing. Neither Morocco nor Mauritania accepted this, and on October 31, 1975, Morocco sent its [[Military of Morocco|army]] into Western Sahara to attack Polisario positions. The public [[diplomacy]] between Spain and Morocco continued, however, with Morocco demanding bilateral negotiations over the fate of the territory.

[[Image:Cold War Africa 1980.PNG|thumb|upright=1.3|Cold War Allegiances in Africa, 1980]]

On November 6, 1975 Morocco launched the [[Green March]] into Western Sahara. About 350,000 unarmed [[Morocco|Moroccans]] accompanied by the Moroccan Army armed with heavy weapons 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 of international pressure, Spain acceded to Moroccan demands, and entered bilateral negotiations. This led to the [[Madrid Accords|Madrid Agreement]] and the [[Western Sahara partition agreement]], treaties that divided the administration of the territory between Morocco and Mauritania, but did not impact the sovereignty debate. Spain, Morocco and Mauritania did not consult the Sahrawi population, and the Polisario violently opposed the treaties. The developments chance in the region until the 1990s were strongly influenced by the power struggle of the [[Cold War]]. [[Algeria]], [[Libya]] and [[Mali]] were allied to the [[Eastern bloc]]. [[Morocco]] was the only African country in the region that was allied to the [[Western world|West]].

Algeria gave help to the Movimiento de Liberación del Sahara,<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Cowl|first1=Carl|last2=Augier|first2=Pierre|date=September 1977|title=Algeria (Sahara)|journal=Ethnomusicology|volume=21|issue=3|page=533|doi=10.2307/850751|jstor=850751|issn=0014-1836}}</ref> that in the late 1960s and early 1970s formed a section of new ''split youngs''. The majority of the Sahrawi people supported its patriotic actions and identified with this movement, which later was called Polisario,<ref>{{Citation|title=Appendix 2. Tribes in Western Sahara|date=2017-01-31|work=Sovereignty in Exile|pages=247–250|publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press|doi=10.9783/9780812293159-011|isbn=978-0-8122-9315-9}}</ref> and gradually had more misunderstandings with the Autonomous and [[Madrid|Central Government]] of the Metropoli for the signs of a ''vacilante'', or feeble foreign policy, made up by generals that had the "última palabra" or "last word", feeling a possible betrayal of the ''Motherland''.

On November 14, 1975, Spain, Morocco and Mauritania signed the Madrid Accords, hence setting up a timetable for the retrieval of Spanish forces and ending Spanish occupation of Western Sahara.  These accords were signed by the three parties in accordance with all international standards.  In these accords, Morocco was set to annex back 2/3 of the northern part of Western Sahara, whereas the lower third would be given to Mauritania.
Polisario established their own Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, and combined guerrilla warfare with their conventional military forces, the Sahrawi People's Liberation Army (SPLA).

On February 26, 1976 Spain's formal mandate over the territory ended when it handed administrative power on to Morocco in a ceremony in Laayoune. The day after, the Polisario proclaimed in [[Bir Lehlou]] the [[Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic]] (SADR) as a [[government in exile]]. Mauritania in its turn renamed the southern parts of [[Río de Oro]] as [[Tiris al-Gharbiyya]], but proved unable to maintain control over the territory. Polisario made the weak Mauritanian army its main target, and after a bold raid on the Mauritanian capital Nouakchott (where a gunshot killed [[El-Ouali Mustapha Sayed|El-Ouali]], the first president of the SADR), Mauritania succumbed to internal unrest. The presence of a large number of Sahrawi nationalists among the country's dominant [[Moors|Moorish]] population made the Mauritanian government's position yet more fragile, and thousands of Mauritanian Sahrawis defected to Polisario. In 1978 the army seized control of the Mauritanian government and Polisario declared a cease-fire, on the assumption that Mauritania would withdraw unconditionally. This eventually occurred in 1979, as Mauritania's new rulers agreed to surrender all claims and to recognize the SADR. Following Mauritania's withdrawal, however, Morocco extended its control to the rest of the territory, and the war continued.

Through the 1980s, the war stalemated through the construction of a desert sand berm, the [[Moroccan Wall]]. Sporadic fighting continued, and Morocco faced heavy burdens due to the economic costs of its massive troop deployments along the Wall. To some extent aid sent by [[Saudi Arabia]], France and by the USA relieved the situation in Morocco, but matters gradually became unsustainable for all parties involved.

===Cease-fire===
In 1991, Morocco and the Polisario Front agreed on a [[United Nations|UN]]-backed [[cease-fire]] in the [[Settlement Plan]]. This plan, its further detail fleshed out in the 1997 [[Houston Agreement]], hinged upon Morocco's agreement to a [[referendum]] on [[independence]] or unification with Morocco voted on by the Sahrawi population. The plan intended this referendum to constitute their exercise of self-determination, thereby completing the territory's yet unfinished process of [[decolonization]]. The UN dispatched a [[UN peacekeeping|peace-keeping mission]], the [[United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara|MINURSO]], to oversee the cease-fire and make arrangements for the vote. Initially scheduled for 1992, the referendum has not taken place, due to the conflict over who has the right to vote.

Two subsequent attempts to resolve the problem by means of a negotiated political settlement by James Baker, acting as Personal [[Diplomacy|Envoy]] of the [[UN Secretary General]], the first in 2000 and the second in 2003, failed to gain acceptance, the first being rejected by the Polisario and second by Morocco. Both attempts, the first referred to as "The Framework Agreement" and the second commonly referred to as "The Peace Plan", contained the proposal of autonomy for the region under Moroccan sovereignty as core elements of the plans. Failure to gain acceptance by the parties to either proposal was a result of what each of the parties viewed as fundamental flaws in the respective proposals.

The Framework Agreement would have required the parties to agree on the specific terms of a political settlement based on the Autonomy/Sovereignty formula through direct negotiations. Baker presented the Peace Plan as a non-negotiable package that would have obliged each of the parties to accept its terms without further amendment. Both proposals contained elements that would have required popular endorsement of the solution through a referendum of the concerned populations. The UN Security Council declined to formally endorse either of the two proposals, which led eventually to Baker's resignation as Personal Envoy.<ref>{{Citation|last=Smith|first=James D.D.|title=The Imposed Cease-fire: "YOU can't make us"|date=2018-03-13|work=Stopping Wars|pages=217–248|publisher=Routledge|doi=10.4324/9780429497117-9|isbn=978-0-429-49711-7}}</ref>

The prolonged cease-fire has held without major disturbances, but Polisario has repeatedly threatened to resume fighting if no breakthrough occurs. Morocco's withdrawal from both the terms of the original [[Settlement Plan]] and the [[Baker Plan]] negotiations in 2003 left the peace-keeping mission without a political agenda, which further increased the risks of renewed war.

Meanwhile, the gradual liberalization of political life in Morocco during the 1990s belatedly reached Western Sahara around 2000. This spurred political protest, as former "[[forced disappearance|disappeared]]" and other [[human rights]]-campaigners began holding illegal [[Demonstration (people)|demonstrations]] against Moroccan rule. The subsequent crackdowns and arrests drew media attention to the Moroccan occupation, and Sahrawi nationalists seized on the opportunity: in May 2005, a wave of demonstrations subsequently dubbed by the [[Independence Intifada (Western Sahara)|Independence Intifada]] by Polisario supporters, broke out. These demonstrations, which continued into the following year, were the most intense in years, and engendered a new wave of interest in the conflict, as well as new fears of instability. Polisario demanded international intervention but declared that it could not stand idly by if the "escalation of repression" continued.

In 2007, Morocco requested U.N. action against a congress to be held by the Polisario Front in Tifariti from December 14 to December 16. Morocco claimed Tifariti was part of a buffer zone and holding the congress there violated a cease-fire between the two parties. Additionally, the Polisario Front had been reported as planning a vote on a proposal for making preparations for war; if passed, it would have been the first time in 16 years preparations for war had been part of the Polisario's strategy.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://africa.reuters.com/top/news/usnBAN255858.html|title=Morocco says Polisario threatens peace in Maghreb|work=[[Reuters]]|date=2007-12-12|access-date=2007-12-12|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071215134055/http://africa.reuters.com/top/news/usnBAN255858.html|archive-date=2007-12-15}}</ref>

In October 2010, Gadaym Izik camp was set up near [[Laayoune]] as a protest by displaced [[Sahrawi people]] about their living conditions. It was home to more than 12,000 people. In November 2010, Moroccan security forces entered Gadaym Izik camp in the early hours of the morning, using helicopters and [[water cannon]]s to force people to leave. The Polisario Front said Moroccan security forces had killed a 26-year-old protester at the camp, a claim denied by Morocco. Protesters in Laayoune threw stones at police and set fire to tires and vehicles. Several buildings, including a TV station, were also set afire. Moroccan officials said five security personnel had been killed in the unrest.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-11710400|title=Deadly clashes as Morocco breaks up Western Sahara camp|work=[[BBC]]|date=2010-09-11|access-date=2010-11-13}}</ref>
{{See also|2010–2011 Sahrawi protests}}

In 2020, the Polisario Front brought legal action against [[New Zealand]]'s superannuation fund for accepting "blood phosphate" from the occupied region.<ref name="nz">{{Cite web |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/16/west-saharan-group-takes-new-zealand-superannuation-fund-to-court-over-blood-phosphate |title=West Saharan Group Takes New Zealand Superannuation Fund to Court over 'Blood Phosphate' |last=Doherty |first=Brian |date=March 15, 2020 |access-date=March 15, 2020 |work=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref> In November [[2020 Western Saharan clashes|a brief conflict]] broke out near the Southern village of [[Guerguerat]], with Morocco claiming to want to end a blockade of a road to Mauritania, and to pave that road.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/morocco-polisario-western-sahara-conflict |title=Tired of stalemate, Sahrawis support Polisario military action against Morocco |author=Habibulah Mohamed Lamin |work=Middle East Eye |date=20 November 2020 |access-date=22 November 2020}}</ref>