UN seeks to sweep away last traces of imperial age

In this Sunday Feb. 27, 2011 file picture, pro-independence Polisario Front rebel soldiers parade in the Western Sahara village of Tifariti to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the RASD (Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic). After Spanish colonizers left Western Sahara in 1975, Morocco and Mauritania went to war over it. By 1979, Mauritania had pulled out and Morocco had taken over. The U.N. established a mission in Western Sahara in 1991 to oversee a referendum by the region’s estimated 500,000 residents and monitor a cease-fire between Moroccan and independence forces. But Morocco has rejected a self-determination vote, instead proposing wide-ranging autonomy for the territory it characterizes as historically Moroccan. (AP Photo/Arturo Rodriguez)