Frontiers in North Africa

iii) From Figuig to the Dra

The Varnier proposals west of Figuig were not permanently accepted, however. After 1923, the French Protectorate in Morocco began to consider that a line somewhat to the south of the Varnier line would be more appropriate and, at the same time, that the centre of Ighli, at the junction of Guir and Zousfana rivers, should mark the southernmost extent of Moroccan sovereignty. The line then ran westwards, to the south of the Hammada du Guir and the Tafilalt, towards the Oued Dra which it joined at Taounite. A series of conferences were held during the 1920s between French officials in Morocco, Algeria and the AOF to resolve this issue and the others associated with Morocco's borders with the Western Sahara. However, they were unsuccessful in providing for any final delimitation and had to deal with a further series of disputes after 1921 reflecting differential customs duties between the Protectorate and Algeria. Further problems were caused by the fact that the putative dividing line crossed tribal migration routes (Trout 1969; 247-254).

In the end, the problem of the border region was rendered acute by continuing dissidence and, as a result, a new regime was created for it in 1929. This was the Confins Algero-Marocains, a zone of joint command between Algeria and Morocco, in which the Moroccan Resident General was to have overall military command, while the Algerian Governor General was to maintain administration of areas designated as Algerian. This system - which effectively avoided the thorny question of juridical sovereignty - lasted up to Moroccan independence in 1959. During the 1930s, however, there was a constant struggle between Algiers and Rabat over administrative responsibility for one portion of the Confins or another, once dissidence had been brought to an end (Trout 1969; 300).

By the Second World War, two conflicting views had emerged over the border, one held by the Protectorate and the other, with equal tenacity, by the Algerian authorities. The Protectorate claimed a line from the Jabal Grouz down the Oued Guir to just north of Ighli and then running as a straight line to contact the north eastern edge of the Western Sahara border along the 27 40' N parallel just north west of Tindouf. The Algerian administration claimed a parallel line running north of the Protectorate line, which started from the Jabal Grouz and then west via the Jabal Mehiriz north of Bou Kais to run south along the escarpment of the Hammada du Guir at Djihani until it turned to run as a straight line to the Ktaoua bend of the Dra river from a point just north west of Abadla. It then followed the northern border of Spanish-held southern Morocco to the coast at Cap Noun - in a strange echo of the 1909 Niamey Conference line which set the southern Saharan borders of Algeria.