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254 pages, Hardback and Jacketed
234x170mm, Portrait

Publication Date: June 2008



ISBN-10: 1905299877
ISBN-13: 9781905299874
 
Saharan Conflict
Towards Territorial Autonomy as a Right to Democratic Self Determination
 
Located on the west coast of Africa between Morocco to the north and Mauritania to the south and east, Western Sahara has long been a troubled region. Resolving the conflict in this disputed territory, and bringing relief to the human suffering in its wake, has proved challenging in the extreme.

Since 1965 the United Nations has worked tirelessly to bring the unrest in Western Sahara to an end; efforts that have been largely in vain. The so-called 'self-determination independence solution' proved to be anything but. Guerrilla warfare continued, and countless Saharawis found themselves displaced.

The 1990s, however, brought improved prospects for the diplomatic process, with the UN declaring its support for Western Sahara's designation as an autonomous region (AR) under Moroccan sovereignty. This fresh solution - a self-determining region officially recognised by the international community, with designated boundaries and administered by a parental state - mirrors that of successful ARs elsewhere, including Greenland and the Faroe Islands (under sovereignty of Denmark), Aland Island (Finland) and Catalonia (Spain).

In The Saharan Conflict, Abdelhamid El Ouali espouses the establishment of a Moroccan-administered Western Sahara AR, and outlines Rabat's vision for the Region, its implementation, governance and economic prospects. Professor El Ouali provides a much-needed scholarly account of the struggle for one of the last remaining white spaces on today's political map of the world - and makes the timely case for its resolution.
Abdelhamid El Ouali - Abdelhamid El Ouali is a professor with the Faculty of Law at the University of Casablanca. He directed the Department of Political Sciences at the same faculty, and went on to occupy senior roles at the United Nations. He is the author many books on international justice, international legal order and refugees.

Professor El Ouali has been working for several years researching the concept of official territoriality and the phenomenon of state disintegration. Professor El Ouali is an international authority on Western Sahara, and his writing on the subject is widely published.