Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic in the context of "Maghreb"

A country is an area of land, which has its own government and laws, or used to have them, such as a state, a nation, a nation state, or other political entity. When referring to a specific polity, the term "country" may refer to a sovereign state, a state with limited recognition, a constituent country, or a dependent territory. Most sovereign states, but not all countries, are members of the United Nations.

There is no universal agreement on the number of "countries" in the world with a range between 193 to 237. This ambiguity is a result of several states having disputed sovereignty status or limited recognition, and a number of non-sovereign entities are commonly considered countries. The definition and usage of the word "country" has fluctuated and changed over time. The Economist wrote in 2010 that "any attempt to find a clear definition of a country soon runs into a thicket of exceptions and anomalies."

Western Sahara is a non-self-governing territory in North-western Africa undergoing decolonization. It has a surface area of 272,000 square kilometres (105,000 sq mi). Western Sahara is the last African colonial state yet to achieve independence and has been dubbed "Africa's last colony". With an estimated population of around 600,000 inhabitants, it is the most sparsely populated territory in Africa and the second most sparsely populated territory in the world, consisting mainly of desert flatlands.

Spain previously colonized the territory as the Spanish Sahara until 1976, when it attempted to transfer its administration to Morocco and Mauritania while ignoring an International Court of Justice's verdict that those countries had no sovereignty over Western Sahara. A war erupted and the Polisario Front—a national liberation movement recognized by the United Nations as the legitimate representative of the people of Western Sahara—proclaimed the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) with a government-in-exile in Tindouf, Algeria. Mauritania withdrew its claims in 1979, and Morocco secured de facto control of most of the territory, including all major cities and most natural resources. A UN-sponsored ceasefire agreement was reached in 1991, though a planned referendum monitored by the UN's MINURSO mission has since stalled.

North Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region. However, it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of the Western Sahara in the west, to Egypt and Sudan's Red Sea coast in the east.

The most common definition for the region's boundaries includes Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, and Western Sahara, the territory disputed between Morocco and the partially recognized Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. The United Nations’ definition includes all these countries as well as Sudan. The African Union defines the region similarly, only differing from the UN in excluding the Sudan and including Mauritania. The Sahel, south of the Sahara Desert, can be considered as the southern boundary of North Africa. North Africa includes the Spanish cities of Ceuta and Melilla, and the plazas de soberanía. It can also be considered to include Malta, as well as other Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish regions such as Lampedusa and Lampione, Madeira, and the Canary Islands, which are all either closer to the African continent than Europe or as close to the African continent as Europe.

This is a list of the current 54 African countries sorted by population, also sorted by normalized demographic projections from the most recently available census or demographic data. Africa is the fastest growing continent in the world, currently increasing by 2.35% per year as of 2021. Africa is also the continent with the youngest population, as 60% of Africans are 24 years of age or younger. This list also includes the French department Réunion, and the partially recognized country Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, commonly known as Western Sahara, which is a member of the African Union.

The Western Sahara War was an armed conflict between the Sahrawi Indigenous Polisario Front and Morocco from 1975 to 1991 (and Mauritania from 1975 to 1979), being the most significant phase of the Western Sahara conflict. The conflict erupted after the withdrawal of Spain from the Spanish Sahara in accordance with the Madrid Accords (signed under the pressure of the Green March), by which it transferred administrative control of the territory to Morocco and Mauritania, but not sovereignty. In late 1975, the Moroccan government organized the Green March of some 350,000 Moroccan citizens, escorted by around 20,000 troops, who entered Western Sahara, trying to establish a Moroccan presence. While at first met with just minor resistance by the Polisario Front, Morocco later engaged a long period of guerrilla warfare with the Sahrawi nationalists. During the late 1970s, the Polisario Front, desiring to establish an independent state in the territory, attempted to fight both Mauritania and Morocco. In 1979, Mauritania withdrew from the conflict after signing a peace treaty with the Polisario Front. The war continued in low intensity throughout the 1980s, though Morocco made several attempts to take the upper hand in 1989–1991. A cease-fire agreement was finally reached between the Polisario Front and Morocco in September 1991. Some sources put the final death toll between 10,000 and 20,000 people.

The Western Sahara conflict has since shifted from military to civilian resistance. A peace process, attempting to resolve the conflict has not yet produced any permanent solution to Sahrawi refugees and territorial agreement between Morocco and the Sahrawi Republic. Today most of the territory of Western Sahara is under Moroccan occupation, while the inland parts are governed by the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, managed by the Polisario Front.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Saguia el-Hamra and Río de Oro, better known by its acronym Polisario Front, is a Sahrawi nationalist liberation movement seeking to end the occupation of Western Sahara through the means of self-determination and armed resistance.

Tracing its origin to a Sahrawi nationalist organization known as the Movement for the Liberation of Saguia el Hamra and Wadi el Dhahab, the Polisario Front was formally constituted in 1973 with the intention of launching an armed struggle against the Spanish occupation which lasted until 1975, when the Spanish decided to allow Mauritania and Morocco to partition and occupy the territory. The Polisario Front proclaimed the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) on 27 February 1976, and waged a war to drive out the two armies. It forced Mauritania to relinquish its claim over Western Sahara in 1979 and continued its military campaign against Morocco until the 1991 ceasefire, pending the holding of a UN-backed referendum which has been consistently postponed ever since. In 2020 the Polisario Front declared the ceasefire over and resumed the armed conflict.

The United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (Arabic: بعثة الأمم المتحدة لتنظيم استفتاء في الصحراء الغربية; French: Mission des Nations Unies pour l'Organisation d'un Référendum au Sahara Occidental; Spanish: Misión de las Naciones Unidas para la Organización de un Referéndum en el Sáhara Occidental; MINURSO) is the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Western Sahara, established in 1991 under United Nations Security Council Resolution 690 as part of the Settlement Plan, which had paved way for a cease-fire in the conflict between Morocco and the Polisario Front (representing the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic) over the contested territory of Western Sahara (formerly Spanish Sahara).

MINURSO's mission was to monitor the cease-fire and to organize and conduct a referendum in accordance with the Settlement Plan, which would enable the Sahrawi people of Western Sahara to choose between integration with Morocco and independence. This was intended to constitute a Sahrawi exercise of self-determination, and thus complete Western Sahara's still-unfinished process of decolonization (Western Sahara is the last major territory remaining on the UN's list of non-decolonized territories.)

The Free Zone or Liberated Territories (Arabic: المنطقة الحرة, romanized: al-minṭaqa al-ḥurra) is a term used by the Polisario Front government of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, a partially recognized sovereign state in the western Maghreb, to describe the part of Western Sahara that lies to the east of a 2,200-kilometre (1,400 mi) border wall flanked by a minefield, often referred as the Berm, and to the west and north of the borders with Algeria and Mauritania, respectively. It is controlled by the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, as opposed to the area to the west of the Berm, which is occupied by Morocco as part of its Southern Provinces. Both states claim the entirety of Western Sahara as their territory.

The zone was consolidated as a Polisario-held zone in a 1991 cease-fire between the Polisario Front and Morocco, which had been agreed upon together as part of the Settlement Plan. Morocco occupies the areas west of the Berm, including most of the territory's population. The cease-fire is overseen by the United Nations' MINURSO forces, charged with peacekeeping in the area and the organization of a referendum on independence.

The Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) was proclaimed by the Polisario Front on 27 February 1976, in Bir Lehlu, Western Sahara. SADR claims sovereignty over the entire territory of Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony; however, at present the SADR government controls approximately 20–25% of the territory it claims. It calls the territories under its control the "Liberated Territories", whilst Morocco claims its territories as the "Southern Provinces".

The Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic has been recognized by 84 United Nations (UN) member states, but, as of November 2024, only 46 member states recognize it due to numerous member states changing their recognition to "frozen" or "withdrawn". SADR has, at some point in time, been recognized by 38 out of the other 54 (70%) African Union (AU) member states, 18 out of 57 (32%) Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) member states, and 5 out of 22 (23%) Arab League (AL) member states. Several states that do not recognize the Sahrawi Republic nonetheless recognize the Polisario Front as the legitimate representative of the population of the Western Sahara, but not as the government-in-exile of a sovereign state.