December 3, 1974 – Western Sahara War: The UN passes a resolution to evaluate the aspirations of residents of the Spanish Sahara
On December 3, 1974, the UNGA passed Resolution 3292declaring the UN’s interest in evaluating the political aspirations of Sahrawisin the Spanish territory. For thispurpose, the UN formed the UN Decolonization Committee, which in May – June1975, carried out a fact-finding mission in Spanish Sahara as well as in Morocco, Mauritania,and Algeria. In its final report to the UN on October 15,1978, the Committee found broad support for annexation among the generalpopulation in Morocco and Mauritania. In Spanish Sahara,however, the Sahrawi people overwhelmingly supported independence under theleadership of the Polisario Front, whileSpain-backed PUNS did not enjoy such support. In Algeria,the UN Committee found strong support for the Sahrawis’ right ofself-determination.
(Taken from Western Sahara War – Wars of the 20th Century – Volume 4)
BackgroundAlthough Spainhad operated in the West African coast since the 16th century, itwas only in the early 1880s that the Spanish established a permanent colonialpresence in the region. In February1883, the Spanish set up a trading post in the area they called Villa Cisnerosin order to enhance their fishing interests and to deter pirate activitiesagainst the Canary Islands, a Spanish possession since the 1400s. Then in the Berlin Conference (November 1884– February 1885), the European colonial powers awarded to Spain the yet undefined region in the Africancoast that Spainhad occupied. The period of the late 1880scoincided with the event known as the “Scramble for Africa”,where European powers carved up the largely undeveloped African continent intocolonial territories.
The Spanish met stiff resistance from the indigenousSahrawi Berber-Arab tribes, but gradually extended control and established moretrading settlements on the coastline from Cape Bojadorin the north to Cap Blanc in the south. The main threat to the Spanish was the other major European colonizer ofthe region, France, which eventuallywould establish French West Africa, a vast territory that encompassed much ofnorthwest Africa. By the 1930s, however, the two Europeanpowers had agreed on the limits of their territories; Spain also extended itscontrol inland from the coast, subduing resisting tribes and then quellingsubsequent uprisings, and by 1936 had established two regions called Saguiael-Hamra (in the north) and Rio de Oro (in the south).
In December 1946, Spainmerged Saguia el-Hamra and Rio de Oro (collectively called Spanish Sahara) with itsother West African territories, i.e. the southern zone of its protectorate of Morocco in CapeJuby and Tarfaya, and the Ifni region, into one administrative region calledSpanish West Africa with its capital at Villa Cisneros (Figure 13). Spanish West Africa ended in April 1958following the Ifni War when Spainceded to Morocco the regionsof Cape Jubyand Tarfaya, and relinquished control over much of the Ifni region;subsequently in January 1969, Spainalso ceded to Morocco thecity of Sidi Ifni, Ifni’scapital. In the meantime, in January1958, Spain declared Spanish Sahara a province and integrated the territoryinto the motherland.
For the Spanish government, Spanish Sahara had beena financial liability, the mostly barren, uninhabitable desert apparentlyyielding no economic benefits, with its rich maritime fishing resourcesbringing some export revenues but nonetheless incapable of reversing the needfor Spain to allocate some amount of money annually to run the colony’sadministration. But in the late 1940s,commercial quantities of high-grade phosphate deposits were discovered in BouCraa, and theprospect of finding petroleum oil sparked Spain’sinterest to hold onto the territory despite the growing wave ofanti-colonialism that had been sweeping across Africasince the end of World War II.
In December 1960, the United Nations GeneralAssembly (UNGA) passed Resolution 1514 titled “Declaration on the Granting ofIndependence to Colonial Countries and Peoples”, a landmark act thatestablished the UN’s principle of decolonization; an implementing agency calledthe Special Committee on Decolonization, was formed to undertake thedecolonization process. Based onResolution 1514, the UNGA created a list called the “In-Trust andNon-self-governing Territories”, which contained territories that were stillunder colonial rule. In 1963, Spanish Sahara was placed on that list.
In April 1956, Moroccogained full independence after Franceand Spainended their protectorates over the Moroccan state. The Istiqlal Party, an ultra-nationalistpolitical party, advocated “Greater Morocco”, whichcalled for the integration with present-day Morocco of lands and peopleshistorically governed by or subservient to the ancient Moroccan Sultanate. The concept of a Greater Morocco receivedbroad support among the Moroccan population. The Moroccan government, led by King Mohammed V, officially did notendorse this policy, but also did not discourage – and even tacitly supported –its adherents from carrying out activities in support thereof.
Thus, the government remained neutral when, in theIfni War (previous article) ofOctober 1957, Moroccan militias of the Moroccan Army of Liberation (MAL) invadedSpanish possessions in Western Africa that Moroccan nationalists believed werehistorically part of Morocco. In the aftermath, Spain ceded a portion of its WestAfrican possessions. Then in 1963, Morocco fought a border war with Algeria in a failed attempt to capture territoryin western Algeria that washistorically part of Moroccoand was included in the “Greater Morocco” concept.
By the first half of the 1970s, strong internationalpressure was bearing down on Spainto decolonize Spanish Sahara; the Spanishgovernment’s justification of the territory being a Spanish “overseas province”was rejected by the UN. King Mohammed Vled the call for decolonization, declaring that Spanish Sahara was historicallya part of Moroccoand thus must be returned to its owner. Mauritania also made a rival claim to theregion, citing ethnic and cultural ties between northern Mauritanian peoplesand Spanish Sahara’s Sahrawi tribes. Compounding Spain’s problems was the factthat since May 1973, Spanish Sahara itself was caught up in an uprising led bythe Popular Front for the Liberation of Saguia el-
Hamraand Río de Oro (or Polisario Front; Spanish: Frente Popular de Liberación de Saguíael Hamra y Río de Oro), a localSahrawi armed militia that was fighting a guerilla war to end Spanish rule andachieve independence for Spanish Sahara.
In 1974, Spain finally acquiesced,announcing that it was ready to grant self-determination for the Sahrawi peoplecorresponding to the UN resolutions. InDecember 1974, Spain carriedout a population census in Spanish Sahara inorder to prepare a voters list that would be used in a forthcoming referendumto determine the political wishes of the Sahrawi population. In a final bid to keep its economic, if notpolitical, hold on the region, in November 1974, the Spanish government formedthe Sahrawi National Union Party (PUNS; Spanish: Partido de Unión Nacional Saharaui), a political party mostlycomposed of the leaders and elders of the various Sahrawi tribes. Spainhoped to establish a PUNS-led government in either an autonomous or independentSahara that would retain a pro-Spanish foreignpolicy.
On December 3, 1974, the UNGA passed Resolution 3292declaring the UN’s interest in evaluating the political aspirations of Sahrawisin the Spanish territory. For thispurpose, the UN formed the UN Decolonization Committee, which in May – June1975, carried out a fact-finding mission in Spanish Sahara as well as in Morocco, Mauritania,and Algeria. In its final report to the UN on October 15,1978, the Committee found broad support for annexation among the generalpopulation in Morocco and Mauritania. In Spanish Sahara,however, the Sahrawi people overwhelmingly supported independence under theleadership of the Polisario Front, whileSpain-backed PUNS did not enjoy such support. In Algeria,the UN Committee found strong support for the Sahrawis’ right ofself-determination.
Algeriapreviously had shown little interest in the Polisario Front and, in an ArabLeague summit held in October 1974, even backed the territorial ambitions of Morocco and Mauritania. But by summer of 1975, Algeria was openly defending thePolisario Front’s struggle for independence, a support that later would includemilitary and economic aid and would have a crucial effect in the coming war.
Meanwhile, King Hassan II, the Moroccan monarch (sonof King Mohammed V, who had passed away in 1961) actively sought to pursue itsclaim and asked Spainto postpone holding the referendum; in January 1975, the Spanish governmentgranted the Moroccan request. In June1975, the Moroccan government pressed the UN to raise the Saharan issue to theInternational Court of Justice (ICJ), the UN’s primary judicial agency. On October 16, 1975, one day after the UNDecolonization Committee report was released, the ICJ issued its decision,which consisted of the following four important points (the court refers toSpanish Sahara as Western Sahara):
