The original inhabitants of Mauritania were the Bafour, presumably a Mande ethnic group, connected to the contemporary Arabized minor social group of Imraguen ("fishermen") on the Atlantic coast.
Moktar Ould Daddah was a Mauritanian politician who led the country after it gained its independence from France. Daddah served as the country's first Prime Minister from 1957 to 1961 and as its first President of Mauritania, a position he held from 1960 until he was deposed in a military coup d'etat in 1978.
The Madrid Accords, formally the Declaration of Principles on Western Sahara, was a treaty between Spain, Morocco, and Mauritania setting out six principles which would end the Spanish presence in the territory of Spanish Sahara and arrange a temporary administration in the area pending a referendum.
The Union of the Forces of Progress is a centre-left to left-wing political party in Mauritania.
Col. Mustafa Ould Salek was the president of Mauritania from 1978 to 1979.
Col. Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidallah was the head of state of Mauritania from 4 January 1980 to 12 December 1984.
Tiris al-Gharbiyya was the name for the area of Western Sahara under Mauritanian control between 1975 and 1979.
Ain Ben Tili is a small village-fort in northeast Mauritania, on the border with Western Sahara. It is part of the Tiris Zemmour region.
The Sahrawi National Union Party, or Partido de Unión Nacional Saharaui (PUNS), was a short-lived political party set up by Francoist Spain to rally indigenous support in its rebellious Spanish Sahara colony.
Opération Lamantin was a December 1977 – July 1978 military intervention by France on the behalf of the Mauritanian government, in its war against Sahrawi guerrilla fighters of the Polisario Front, seeking independence for Western Sahara. Airstrikes were launched in the provinces with the aim of stopping separatist raids in the rail route from the iron mines in Zouérat to the coast of Nouadhibou, and pushing them to release French hostages. France used Jaguar combat aircraft from Dakar Airbase. The bombings targeted areas around the railway, which was constantly raided by Polisario. The mission ended with the release of the hostages and the halt of Polisario's attacks on ore cargo.
Since the end of the 1980s, several members of POLISARIO have decided to discontinue their military or political activities for the Polisario Front. Most of them returned from the Sahrawi refugee camps in Algeria to Morocco, among them a few founder members and senior officials. Some of them are now actively promoting Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara, which Morocco considers its Southern Provinces. Their individual reasons to stop working for POLISARIO, as reported in the media, vary, but include allegations of human rights violations, monopolization and abuse of power, blackmailing and sequestering the refugee population in Tindouf, and squandering foreign aid. They also claim POLISARIO is controlled by the government of Algeria and as one former member of POLISARIO put it, "[was] a group of Moroccan students who were urging the Spanish colonizer to leave and who had never claimed independence or the separation from motherland Morocco."
The Military Committee for National Salvation was a military Government of Mauritania that took power in the 1979 coup d'état. It was installed by Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidalla, Ahmed Ould Bouceif and fellow officers, in an internal regime/military coup on April 6, 1979, removing Colonel Mustafa Ould Salek of the Military Committee for National Recovery (CMRN) from effective power. He was officially replaced by Mohamed Mahmoud Ould Louly in June 1979. Haidalla would later emerge as the main military strongman and go on to assume full powers in the 1980 coup d'état, only to be deposed by Colonel Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya in the December 1984 coup d'état.
The Alliance for a Democratic Mauritania was a Mauritanian clandestine opposition movement.
Greater Mauritania is a term for the Mauritanian irredentist claim that generally includes the Western Sahara and other Sahrawi-populated areas of the western Sahara Desert. The term was initially used by Mauritania's first President, Mokhtar Ould Daddah, as he began claiming the territory then known as Spanish Sahara even before Mauritanian independence in 1960.
The Western Sahara War was an armed struggle between the Sahrawi indigenous Polisario Front and Morocco from 1975 to 1991, 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, 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.
Mauritania, officially the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, is an Arab Maghreb country in West Africa. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean in the west, by Morocco in the north, by Algeria in the northeast, by Mali in the east and southeast, and by Senegal in the southwest. It is named after the ancient Berber Kingdom of Mauretania, which later became a province of the Roman Empire, even though the modern Mauritania covers a territory far to the south of the old Berber kingdom that had no relation with it.
Mauritania, officially the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, is an Arab Maghreb country in West Africa. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean in the west, by Western Sahara in the north, by Algeria in the northeast, by Mali in the east and southeast, and by Senegal in the southwest. It is named after the ancient Berber Kingdom of Mauretania, which later became a province of the Roman Empire, even though the modern Mauritania covers a territory far to the south of the old Berber kingdom that had no relation with it.
Presidential elections were held in Mauritania on 8 August 1976, alongside a parliamentary by-election for the new seven seats representing Tiris El Gharbiya, the Mauritanian-occupied area of Western Sahara. At the time, the country was a one-party state with the Mauritanian People's Party (PPM) as the sole legal party. Its leader, incumbent President Moktar Ould Daddah, was the only candidate and was re-elected unopposed. Voter turnout was 97.9%. They were the last elections held until the restoration of multi-party democracy in 1992.
The raid on Nouakchott in June 1976 was a significant military operation carried out by the Polisario Front, a Western Saharan guerrilla group, against the Mauritanian capital, Nouakchott. Led by their leader El-Ouali Mustapha Sayed, the Polisario forces aimed to overthrow the regime of President Moktar Ould Daddah.
The Attack on Tichla took place on July 12, 1979, in the town of Tichla, in Western Sahara. It marked the final engagement between Mauritania and Polisario before the peace treaty in Algiers and Mauritania's withdrawal from the Western Sahara War.
Polisario Front 
Morocco 
Cmdr. Soueidatt Ould Weddad [1] †