Throughout the year, kitesurfers in need of an adrenaline rush travel the globe to glide on the waters of the Dakhla lagoon in Western Sahara. It is a unique seaside treat which the Moroccan government has turned into a touristic mirage, writes Camille Lavoix.
Some see it as Morocco reinforcing its hold on the region claimed by the Sahrawi people, an indigenous Berber ethnic group, over the past 40 years.
For others, the kitesurfing oasis is the best example of Morocco’s efforts to develop the disputed territory.
However, there is now a renewed risk of conflict in the region.
Flights always land in Dakhla at night. You can barely see the oasis in the middle of the desert. In the shadows, the dunes separate the lagoon from the Atlantic Ocean.
Every day a plane disgorges a new wave of tourists. With sunglasses on their heads, the passengers push their wind and surf boards into the hotels’ 4x4s.
Some tourists might notice the numerous military convoys and the checkpoints dotted along the route.
But the majority do not imagine they are about to travel near a 2,700 km (1,700-mile) wall separating hostile forces which are just 120 metres apart.
It is guarded by 120,000 Moroccan soldiers and packed with anti-personnel mines.
The day after their arrival, the tourists wake up in a small paradise in the middle of Western Sahara.
Listed by the United Nations as a Non-Self-Governing Territory, the former Spanish colony has been bound to hold a referendum on independence since a UN-brokered truce in 1991.
1975-76: Morocco annexes two-thirds of Western Sahara after colonial power Spain withdraws.
1975-76: Polisario Front declares the Saharan Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), with a government-in-exile in Algeria. Thousands of Sahrawi refugees flee to western Algeria to set up camps.
1984: Morocco leaves the Organisation of African Unity (which later became the African Union) in protest at the SADR’s admission to the body.
1991: UN-monitored ceasefire begins in Western Sahara, but the territory’s status remains undecided and ceasefire violations are reported. The following decade sees much wrangling over a proposed referendum on the future of the territory but the deadlock is not broken.
March 2016: Morocco threatens to pull its soldiers out of UN global peacekeeping missions in Western Sahara, after UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon uses the term “occupation” when referring to the territory.
May 2016: Long-time Polisario Front leader Mohamed Abdelaziz dies aged 68.
Meanwhile tourism is booming.
“I think I can hear the sound of the waves,” said 19-year-old tourist Jules, who had difficulty sleeping on his first night here.
But it is actually the sound of the powerful wind which blows for more than 300 days a year, much to the kitesurfers’ delight.
Ten years ago, Jules’ father was one of the first visitors to set up his tent on this unexposed spot.
Since then, the desert has seen kitesurfing traffic jams, especially during the high season between April and November.
Richard Branson’s Virgin group sponsored the 2015 Kitesurfing World Cup series with Dakhla hosting the opening event
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