Related Western Sahara Favorites Tips

Favorite thing: Crossing Western Sahara, you will have a lot of checkpoints of the police. All times you enter a town and at all cross crossroads. Luckily there are not that many.

The police need your name, date and place of birth, profession, nationality, adress, marital state, pasportnumber, place of delivery, names of your father and mother, place of entry, mark, type number of the car.

The best you can do, is making copies (about 10 or 15) of a list of these facts, so you can hand the copie over to the policemen at the checkpoints. This will save lots of time. Mostly after giving the copy the policemen looked into the car and asked only our professions.

Favorite thing: Western Sahara or the former Spanish Sahara was a Spanish colony until 1975. After the withdrawal of Spain, the territory was occupied by Morocco in 1975 during the so called "Green March". Morocco annexed the northern part of Western Sahara in 1976, and also the southern part of the territory in 1979, after the withdrawal of Mauritania.

This resulted in the uprisal of the Polisario Front to fight for the national liberation. The Polisario Front was formed allready in 1973 to fight Spanish colonialism. The Moroccan army erected a wall in the desert to prevent the attacks from the Polisario front. In 1991 the UN succeeded in reaching a cease-fire.

A large part of the Saharawi population emigrated to Algeria and live since more than 25 years in camps near Tindouf. Since the "Green March", Morocco has encouraged Moroccan people to settle in the Western Sahara, but also some Saharawi people integrated in (northern) Morocco.

Since 1975, the UN tried to find a solution for the conflict. An UN-organized referendum on final status has been repeatedly postponed. Morocco has boycotted this referendum. The proposal that currently has gained support (mainly by France and the USA) is that the Sahara should remain under Moroccan control, but with a certain degree of autonomy. The Polisario Front objects to this solution.

Favorite thing: This is the building of the police check point before Dakhla. This place you have to give your passport for identification which is going to secure your presence here. This is quite good for foreigner that might have some problems. At least authorities do know you came to this area.
Many people already bring their private information (with name, address, job, ID number, Passport number, car, car plate all kind of personal info regarding their trip) printed out on a print page to deliver to the police to escape the possibly 15m to 30m waist of time during police check points.

Fondest memory: The Actual Country Name :
al-Jumhuriyya as-Sahrawiyya ad-Dimuqratiyya al-'Arabiyya (Democratic Arab Republic of Sahara)

Size :
Sq. km: 252,120

Population :
252,000

Capital:
al A'ayun (La'Aayoun)

Fondest memory: Hey, come and see the F O R M A L National Flag being widely used by Western Sahara.

This is the only country in Virtual Tourist Web which you can't find the country flag.

The struggle of the Sahrawi people for Self-determination - Western Sahara the former spanish colony is the last african colonized country still waiting for independence. Since 1973 the Polisario Front is fighting for independence. 1975 Morocco and Mauritania invaded the country. Most of the civilian population fled to Algeria, living in refugee camps. The Polisario Front proclaimed in February 1976 the SADR, the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. After 18 years of war the United Nations Peace Plan for Western Sahara was adopted in 1991 by the Security Council. The United Nations mission for the referendum in Western Sahara, MINURSO (Misión de las Naciones Unidas para el Referendum del Sahara Occidental), has been monitoring a cease-fire since September 6 1991 and preparing the self determination referendum.


The Actual Country Name : al-Jumhuriyya as-Sahrawiyya ad-Dimuqratiyya al-'Arabiyya (Democratic Arab Republic of Sahara) Size : Sq. km: 252,120 Population : 252,000 Capital: al A'ayun (La'Aayoun)

Favorite thing: The temparature could get as high as 50C at day and then went down to0C at night.

Favorite thing: from mornig to till sun set, the sandy dune would change at least 3 to 4 type of colur from white to brownish orange colur.

Favorite thing: Apart from the camel story, let's come back to the sand. The color of the sandy dune was very depending to the sunshine.