"The largest protest for separation in Laayoune's history," ran the headline of Arabic daily Akhbar Al-Youm, which also reported the presence of rebel Polisario Front and U.S. Some of the demonstrators in Smara, around 200 kilometers (120 miles) from Laayoune, carried the flag of the "Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic," other local media reported.įrench-language daily Aujourd'hui Le Maroc described the Laayoune protest, which coincided with a visit by a group of foreign journalists, as "an unprecedented gathering by the enemies of (Morocco's) territorial integrity." It gave no information on injuries sustained by the protesters, who it said tried "to occupy the street and block traffic, creating a chaotic situation."
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Protests took place in other Western Saharan towns on Sunday, including in Smara, where 17 members of the security forces were wounded trying to disperse protesters who had set up barricades in the streets, the official MAP news agency reported. Mohamed Salem Charkaoui from Morocco's official National Human Rights Council, cited by news website Lakome, said 2,000 people marched in the Laayoune protest. The clashes also wounded an unknown number of activists, Hamoud Iguilid, the local representative of the Moroccan Association for Human Rights, told Agence France Presse. Some 500 people marched peacefully late on Saturday afternoon, but violence broke out in the evening after the protest, wounding 21 policemen, according to several papers.
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Hundreds of pro-independence Sahrawi activists marched in Laayoune at the weekend, the Western Sahara's largest city, in the biggest protest in several decades, Moroccan press reported Monday.