Morocco troops pull out of Mauritania

Press, 11 August 1979, Page 8

Morocco troops pull out of Mauritania

NZPA-Reuter Rabat Morocco, battling guerrillas who want an independent Western Sahara, is pulling its troops out of neighbouring Mauritania which signed a peace agreement with the Polisario Front independence fighters last week-end. An estimated 6000 Moroccan troops were sent to Mauritania in 1977 to help fight off attacks by the Al-gerian-backed guerrillas. The Polisario, in a statement issued by the Algerian News Agency, said this week that it had killed nearly 800 Moroccan troops and wounded 642 in July.

t Front guerrillas had also - captured 74 Moroccan sol- • diers and seized large quans tities of military equipment f last month, the statement i added. There was no immediate > comment on the Polisario > communique by Morocco. Authoritative sources in ■ Nouakchott said that the > Mauritanian Prime Ninister > (Mr Mohamed Khouna Ould ■ Haidala) would visit Rabat at the week-end. Morocco ■ has rejected the Mauritanian i peace agreement with the > front. 1 Polisario guerrillas have > been fighting an increasingly bloody war since Spain ' ceded the phosphate-rich Western Sahara to Mau-

ritania and Morocco in 1976. Mauritania absorbed the southern third of the former Spanish territory, but waived its claims to the area last Sunday in a peace agreement with the guerrillas. Morocco controls the rest of the former colony. Morocco’s pro-Government press has said several times recently that Rabat had a “pre-emptive right” to the Mauritanian part of the area and, if Nouakchott abandoned it, Morocco was free to take over to ensure' its own security. There has been no official comment so far from Mauritania on Morocco’s troop withdrawal.