부산대학교 도서관

The self-proclaimed Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic recently marked the 31st birthday of its would-be state with the declaration that the people of the Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony, would not accept anything less than a referendum on self-determination and independence from Morocco. The conflict in the Western Sahara is one of Africa's oldest; the Spanish pulled their troops out in 1976, and since then the Polisario Front—a Sahrawi guerrilla group that was already fighting the Spaniards—has been struggling against Morocco, which now controls a large portion of the Western Sahara and is unwilling to offer the option of full independence. Morocco says it will put its autonomy plan for the region to the UN in April 2007, but no break in the diplomatic deadlock is yet in sight.