WikiPedia Information About Mauritania
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Export/Mauritania
/_TheTownGuide/Index_Layout_Leaders_wiki_Process.xsl
{{about
the West African country
other uses
Mauretania}}
{{pp-move-indef}}
{{Infobox Country
native_name = {{lang
ar
????????? ????????? ???????????}}
''Al-Jumhuriyyah al-Islamiyyah al-Muritaniyyah''Republik bu Lislaamu bu Gànnaar{{lang
fr
République Islamique de Mauritanie}}
conventional_long_name = Islamic Republic of Mauritania
common_name = Mauritania
image_flag = Flag of Mauritania.svg
image_coat = EscudoMauritania.PNG
image_map = LocationMauritania.svg
national_motto = ??? ???? ??? {{spaces
2}}(Arabic language
Arabic) (English: Honor, Fraternity, Justice)
national_anthem = Koon Lililahi Nassira
official_languages = Arabic language
Arabic{{smallsup
1}}
demonym = Mauritanian
capital = Nouakchott
latd=18
latm=09
latNS=N
longd=15
longm=58
longEW=W
largest_city = capital
government_type = Republic{{smallsup
2}}
leader_title1 = List of Presidents of Mauritania
President
leader_name1 = Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz
leader_title2 = Prime Minister of Mauritania
Prime Minister
leader_name2 = Moulaye Ould Mohamed Laghdaf
sovereignty_type = Independence
sovereignty_note = from France
established_event1 = Date
established_date1 = 28 November 1960
area_rank = 29th
area_magnitude = 1 E12
area_km2 = 1,030,700
area_sq_mi = 397,954
percent_water = 0ᇻ
population_estimate = 3,291,000[{{cite paper ]
url=http://www.un.org/ esa/population/publications/wpp2008/wpp2008_text_tables.pdf
title=World Population Prospects, Table AǍ
version=2008 revision
format=.PDF
publisher=United Nations
author=Department of Economic and Social Affairs
Population Division
year=2009
accessdate= 2009-03-12}}
population_estimate_year = 2009
population_estimate_rank = 135th
population_census = 1,864,236[{{cite web]
url = http://www.arab.de/arabinfo/maurita.htm
title = Mauritania : Location, Map, Area, Capital, Population, Religion, Language - Country Information
accessdate = 2008-08-06}}
population_census_year = 1988
population_density_km2 = 3ǎ
population_density_sq_mi = 8ǎ
population_density_rank = 221st
GDP_PPP_year = 2008
GDP_PPP = $6뒘 billion[{{cite web]
url=http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft /weo/2009/02/weodata/weorept.aspx?sy=2006&ey=2 009&scsm=1&ssd=1&sort=country&ds=.&br=1&c=682& s=NGDPD%2CNGDPDPC%2CPPPGDP%2CPPPPC%2CLP&grp=0&a=&pr.x=49&pr.y=7
title=Mauritania
publisher=International Monetary Fund
accessdate=2009-10-01}}
GDP_PPP_rank =
GDP_PPP_per_capita = $2,055[
]
GDP_PPP_per_capita_rank =
GDP_nominal = $3둑 billion[
]
GDP_nominal_year = 2008
GDP_nominal_per_capita = $1,042[
]
HDI_year = 2007
HDI = {{increase}} 0떸[[http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/HDR_2009_EN_Complete.pdf Human Development Report 2009].]
The United Nations.
Retrieved 15 October 2009
HDI_rank = 154th
HDI_category = medium
Gini = 39
Gini_year = 2000
Gini_category = medium
currency = Mauritanian ouguiya
Ouguiya
currency_code = MRO
country_code = MR
time_zone =
utc_offset = +0
time_zone_DST = not observed
utc_offset_DST = +0
drives_on = right
cctld = .mr
calling_code = 222
footnotes =1According to article 6 of Constitution: ''The national languages are Arabic, Pular language
Pular, Soninke language
Soninke, and Wolof language
Wolof; the official language is Arabic''
2Not recognized internationally.
Deposed leaders President Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi and Prime Minister Yahya Ould Ahmed El Waghef no longer have power as they were arrested by military forces.
}}
'''Mauritania''' ({{lang-ar
?????????}} Muritaniya; Wolof language
Wolof: Gànnaar; Soninke language
Soninke: Murutaane; Pular language
Pular: Moritani; {{lang-fr
Mauritanie}}), officially the '''Islamic Republic of Mauritania''', is a country in Western Africa.
It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean on the west, by Senegal on the southwest, by Mali on the east and southeast, by Algeria on the northeast, and by the Morocco-controlled Western Sahara on the northwest.
It is named after the Ancient Rome
Roman province of Mauretania, even though the modern state covers a territory far to the southwest of the old province.
The capital and largest city is Nouakchott, located on the Atlantic coast.
The civilian government of Mauritania was overthrown on 6 August 2008, in a military ''coup d'état'' led by General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz.
On April 16, 2009, General Aziz resigned from the military to run for president in the July 19 elections, which he won.
In Mauritania about 20% of the population live on less than US $1ሑ per day.[[http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/HDI_2008_EN_Tables.pdf UNDP: Human development indices - Table 3: Human and income poverty (Population living below national poverty line (2000-2007))]]
History
{{main
History of Mauritania}}
From the fifth to seventh centuries, the migration of Berber tribes from North Africa displaced the Bafours, the original inhabitants of present-day Mauritania and the ancestors of the Soninke people
Soninke.
The Bafours were primarily agriculturalist, and among the first Saharan people to abandon their historically nomadic lifestyle.
With the gradual desiccation of the Sahara, they headed south.
Following them came a migration of not only Central Saharans into West Africa, but in 1076, Moorish Islamic warrior monks (Almoravid or Al Murabitun) attacked and conquered the ancient Ghana Empire.
Over the next 500 years, Arabs overcame fierce resistance from the local population (Berber and non-Berber alike) and came to dominate Mauritania.
The Mauritanian Thirty-Year War (1644–74) was the unsuccessful final effort to repel the Yemeni Maqil Arab invaders led by the Beni Hassan tribe.
The descendants of the Beni Hassan warriors became the hassane
upper stratum of Moors
Moorish society.
Berbers retained influence by producing the majority of the region's Marabouts—those who preserve and teach Islamic tradition.
Many of the Berber tribes claimed Yemeni (and sometimes other Arab) origin: there is little evidence to suggest this, though some studies do make a connection between the two.[{{cite journal ]
author=Chaabani H
coauthors=Sanchez-Mazas A, Sallami SF
year=2000
title=Genetic differentiation of Yemeni people according to rhesus and Gm polymorphisms
journal=Annales de Génétique
volume=43
issue=3-4
pages=155–62
pmid=11164198
accessdate= 2008-08-06
doi=10/S0003-3995(00)01023-6}} Hassaniya, a Berber-influenced Arabic dialect that derives its name from the Beni Hassan, became the dominant language among the largely nomadic population.
French colonization gradually absorbed the territories of present-day Mauritania from the Senegal river area and upwards, starting in the late 1800s.
In 1901, Xavier Coppolani took charge of the colonial mission.
Through a combination of strategic alliances with Zawiya tribes and military pressure on the Hassane warrior nomads, he managed to extend French rule over the Mauritanian emirates: Trarza, Brakna and Tagant Region
Tagant quickly submitted to treaties with the colonial power (1903–04), but the northern emirate of Adrar, Mauritania
Adrar held out longer, aided by the anticolonial rebellion (or jihad) of shaykh Maa al-Aynayn.
It was finally defeated militarily in 1912, and incorporated into the territory of Mauritania, which had been drawn up in 1904.
Mauritania would subsequently form part of French West Africa, from 1920.
French rule brought legal prohibitions against slavery and an end to interclan warfare.
During the colonial period, the population remained nomadic, but many sedentary peoples, whose ancestors had been expelled centuries earlier, began to trickle back into Mauritania.
As the country gained independence in 1960, the capital city Nouakchott was founded at the site of a small colonial village, the Ksar, while 90% of the population was still nomadic.
The great Sahel droughts of the early 1970s caused massive problems in Mauritania.
With independence, larger numbers of indigenous Sub-Saharan African peoples (Haalpulaar, Soninke people
Soninke, and Wolof people
Wolof) entered Mauritania, moving into the area north of the Senegal River.
Educated in French language and customs, many of these recent arrivals became clerks, soldiers, and administrators in the new state.
This occurred as France militarily suppressed the most intransigent Hassane tribes of the Moorish north, shifting old balances of power, and creating new cause for conflict between the southern populations and Moors.
Between these groups stood the Haratin, a very large population of Arabized slaves of black African origins, who lived within Moorish society, integrated into a low-caste social position&# 46[[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6938032.stm Mauritanian MPs pass slavery law].]
BBC News.
August 9, 2007. Modern day Slavery in Mauritania
slavery is still a common practice in this country.[For more information, please read slave-owner Abdel Nasser Ould Yasser's account in "Enslaved, True stories of Modern Day Slavery" edited by Jesse Sage and Liora Kasten, directors of the American Anti-Slavery Group] According to some estimates, up to 600,000 Mauritanians, or 20% of the population, are still enslaved.["[htt p://www.saiia.org.za/index.php?option =com_content&view=article&id=635:mauritaniamadesl averyillegallastmonth&catid=62:governance-a-aprm-opinion&Itemid=159 Mauritania made slavery illegal last month]".]
''South African Institute of International Affairs.'' September 6, 2007.[[http://www.bbc.co.uk/ worldservice/specials/1458_abolition/page4.shtml The Abolition season] on BBC World Service] This social discrimination concerns mainly the Haratin ("black Moors) in the northern part of the country, where tribal elites among "white Moors" (Beidane) hold sway, but low-caste groups within the black African communities of the south are also affected by similar practices.
Moors reacted to the change, and to Arab nationalist calls from abroad, by increasing pressure to Arabization
Arabize many aspects of Mauritanian life, such as law and language.
A schism (religion)
schism developed between those Moors who consider Mauritania to be an Arab country and those who seek a dominant role for the non-Moorish peoples, with various models for containing the country's cultural diversity suggested, but none implemented successfully.
This ethnic discord was evident during intercommunal violence that broke out in April 1989 (the "1989 Events in Mauritania
1989 Events" and "Mauritania-Senegal Border War"), but has since subsided.
Some 70,000 black African Mauritanians were expelled from Mauritania in the late 1980s.[http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=70522 MAURITANIA: Fair elections haunted by racial imbalance].
IRIN.
March 5, 2007. The ethnic tension and the sensitive issue of slavery – past and, in some areas, present – is still a powerful theme in the country's political debate.
A significant number from all groups, however, seek a more diverse, pluralistic society.
{{Wikinews
Mauritania}}The government bureaucracy is composed of traditional ministries, special agencies, and parastatal companies.
The Ministry of Interior spearheads a system of regional governors and prefects modeled on the French system of local administration.
Under this system, Mauritania is divided into thirteen regions (''wilaya''), including the capital district, Nouakchott.
Control is tightly concentrated in the executive branch of the central government, but a series of national and municipal elections since 1992 have produced limited decentralization.
Mauritania, along with Morocco, annexed the territory of Western Sahara in 1976, with Mauritania taking the lower one-third at the request of former colonial power Spain.
After several military losses to the Polisario – heavily armed and supported by Algeria, the local hegemon and rival to Morocco –Mauritania retreated in 1979, and its claims were taken over by Morocco.
Due to economic weakness, Mauritania has been a negligible player in the territorial dispute, with its official position being that it wishes for an expedient solution that is mutually agreeable to all parties.
While most of the former Spanish or Western Sahara has been woven into Morocco, the UN still considers the Western Sahara a territory that needs to express its wishes with respect to statehood: a referendum is still supposed to be held sometimes in the future, under UN auspices, to determine whether or not the “saharaouis” wish to remain part of Morocco.
The Moroccan authorities, on their part, wish the saharaouis to remain part of Morocco and therefore have made significant investments in the area.
The Ould Daddah era (1960-78)
After independence, President of Mauritania
President Moktar Ould Daddah, originally installed by the French, formalized Mauritania into a one-party state in 1964 with a new Constitution of Mauritania
constitution, which set up an authoritarianism
authoritarian presidential regime.
Daddah's own Parti du Peuple Mauritanien (PPM) became the ruling organization in a single-party system.
The President justified this decision on the grounds that he considered Mauritania unready for western-style multi-party system
multi-party democracy.
Under this one-party constitution, Daddah was reelected in uncontested elections in 1966, 1971 and 1976.
He was ousted in a Military Committee for National Recovery
bloodless coup on 10 July 1978, after bringing the country to near-collapse through a disastrous History of Western Sahara
war to annexation
annex the Tiris al-Gharbiyya
southern part of Western Sahara, in an attempt to create a "Greater Mauritania".
CMRN and CMSN military governments (1978-84)
Col.
Mustafa Ould Salek's CMRN military junta
''junta'' proved incapable of either establishing a strong base of power or extracting the country from its destabilizing conflict with the Western Sahara
Sahrawi resistance movement, the Polisario Front.
It quickly fell to be replaced by another military government, the Military Committee for National Salvation
CMSN.
The energetic Col.
Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidallah soon emerged as its main strongman, and by giving up all claims to Western Sahara, he found peace with the Polisario and improved relations with its main backer, Algeria – but relations with the other party to the conflict, Morocco, and its European ally France, deteriorated.
Instability continued, and Haidallah's ambitious reform attempts foundered.
Not only was his regime plagued by attempted coups and intrigue within the military establishment, but it also became increasingly contested because of his harsh and uncompromising line against opponents and political and military dissidents, of whom many were jailed and some were executed.
In 1984 he was deposed by Col.
Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya, who relaxed the political climate somewhat, without relinquishing military control.
Ould Taya moderated Mauritania's previous pro-Algerian stance, and reconnected with Morocco during the late 1980s.
Relations with Morocco deepened during the late 1990s and early 2000s, as part of Mauritania's drive to attract support from Western states and Western-aligned Arab states.
However, Mauritania has not rescinded its recognition of Polisario's Western Saharan exile government, remaining on good terms with Algeria.
Its position on the Western Sahara conflict is, since the 1980s, one of strict neutrality.
Ould Taya's rule (1984-2005)
The ''Parti Républicain Démocratique et Social'' (PRDS), formerly led by President Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya, dominated Mauritanian politics following the country's first multi-party elections in April 1992 following the approval by referendum of the current constitution in July 1991.
President Taya, who won elections in 1992 and 1997, first became chief of state through a 12 December 1984 bloodless coup which made him chairman of the committee of military officers that governed Mauritania from July 1978 to April 1992.
List of political parties in Mauritania
Political parties, illegal during the military period, were legalized again in 1991.
By April 1992, as civilian rule returned, 16 major political parties had been recognized; 12 major political parties were active in 2004.
Most opposition parties boycotted the first legislative election in 1992, and for nearly a decade the parliament was dominated by the PRDS.
The opposition participated in municipal elections in January-February 1994 and subsequent Senate elections, most recently in April 2004, gained representation at the local level as well as three seats in the Senate.
A group of current and former Army officers launched a bloody but unsuccessful coup attempt on 8 June 2003.
The leaders of the attempted coup were never caught.
Mauritania's Mauritanian presidential election, 2003
presidential election, its third since adopting the democracy
democratic process in 1992, took place on 7 November 2003.
Six candidates, including Mauritania's first female and first Haratine (former Slavery in Mauritania
slave family) candidates, represented a wide variety of political goals and backgrounds.
Incumbent President Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya won reelection with 67ᇺ% of the popular vote, according to the official figures, with Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidalla finishing second.
During the late 1980s, Ould Taya had established a close cooperation with Iraq, and pursued a strongly Arab Nationalist line.
At the same time, Mauritania-Senegal Border War
bloody clashes erupted with Senegal in 1989, during which both countries expelled ethnic minorities to the other country.
Mauritania grew increasingly isolated internationally, and tensions with Western countries grew dramatically after it took a pro-Iraqi position during the 1991 Gulf War.
During the mid- to late 1990s, Mauritania shifted its foreign policy to one of increased cooperation with the US and Europe, and was rewarded with diplomatic relaxation and aid projects.
In 1999, Mauritanian Foreign Minister Ahmed Sid’Ahmed and his Israeli counterpart David Levy (Israeli politician)
David Levy signed an agreement in Washington DC, USA, on 28 October, establishing full diplomatic relations with Mauritania, an Islamic country and a member of the Arab League.
The signing ceremony was held at the U.S.
State Department in the presence of U.S.
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.
Mauritania thereby joined Egypt, Palestine and Jordan as the only members of the Arab League to officially recognize Israel.
Ould Taya also started cooperating with the United States in antiterrorism activities, which was criticized by human rights NGOs, who talked of an exaggeration and instrumentation of alleged terrorist activities for geopolitical aims.[{{cite news ]
url=http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/africa/11/23/backlash.forusally.ap/
title=Crackdown courts U.S.
approval
publisher=CNN
date=24 November 2003
accessdate=2008-08-06}}[{{cite news ]
url=http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=47093
title=MAURITANIA: New wave of arrests presented as crackdown on Islamic extremists
publisher=IRIN Africa
date=12 May 2005
accessdate=2008-08-06}} (See also Foreign relations of Mauritania.)
August 2005 military coup
On 3 August 2005, a military coup led by Colonel Ely Ould Mohamed Vall ended Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya's twenty-one years of rule.
On 3 August, the Mauritanian military, including members of the presidential guard, seized control of key points in the capital of Nouakchott.
They took advantage of President Taya's attendance at the funeral of Saudi Arabia
Saudi King Fahd to organize the coup, which took place without loss of life.
The officers, calling themselves the Military Council for Justice and Democracy, released the following statement:
:"The national armed forces and security forces have unanimously decided to put a definitive end to the oppressive activities of the defunct authority, which our people have suffered from during the past years."[{{cite news ]
url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/4741243.stm
publisher=BBC News
title=Mauritania officers 'seize power'
date=4 August 2005
accessdate=2008-08-06}}
The Military Council later issued another statement naming Colonel Vall as president and director of the national police force, the ''Sûreté Nationale''.
Sixteen other officers were listed as members.
Colonel Vall was once regarded as a firm ally of the now-ousted president, even aiding him in the original coup that brought him to power, and later serving as his security chief.
Applauded by the Mauritanian people{{Citation needed
date=June 2008}}, but cautiously watched by the international community, the coup has since been generally accepted, while the military ''junta'' has organized elections within the promised two year timeline.
In a referendum on 26 June 2006, Mauritanians overwhelmingly (97%) approved a new constitution which limited the duration of a president's stay in office.
The leader of the junta, Col.
Vall, promised to abide by the referendum and relinquish power peacefully.
Mauritania's establishment of relations with the State of Israel – it was one of only three Arab states to recognize Israel – was maintained by the new regime, despite widespread criticism from the opposition, who viewed it as a legacy of the Taya regime's attempts to curry favor with the West.
Parliamentary and municipal elections in Mauritania took place on 19 November and 3 December 2006.
2007 Presidential election
The first fully democratic Presidential election since 1960 occurred on 11 March 2007.
The election effected the final transfer from military to civilian rule following the military coup in 2005.
This was the first time that the president had been selected in a multi-candidate election in the country's post-independence history.[{{cite news ]
url=http ://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6440597.stm
publisher=BBC News
title=Mauritania vote 'free and fair'
date=12 March 2007
accessdate=2008-08-06}}
The election was won in a second round of voting by Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi, with Ahmed Ould Daddah a close second.
2008 military coup
{{main
2008 Mauritanian coup d'état}}
File:Sidi Mohamed Ould Cheikh Abdallahi.jpg
thumb
right
upright
Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi.
The head of the Presidential Guards took over the president's palace and units of the army surrounded a key state building in the capital Nouakchott on 6 August 2008, a day after 48 lawmakers from the ruling party resigned.
The army surrounded the state television building after the president sacked (fired) two senior officers, including the head of the presidential guards.
[{{cite web]
url = http://www&# 46tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=174725
title = tehran times : 48 lawmakers resign from ruling party in Mauritania
accessdate = 2008-08-06}} The president, the prime minister and the minister of internal affairs were arrested.
The coup was organized by General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, former chief of staff of the Mauritanian army and head of the Presidential Guard, whom the president had just dismissed.
Mauritania's presidential spokesman, Abdoulaye Mamadouba, said President Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi, Prime Minister Yahya Ould Ahmed Waghf and the interior minister, were arrested by renegade Senior Mauritanian army officers, unknown troops and a group of generals, and were held under house arrest at the presidential palace in Nouakchott.[[http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jOO7pbj1cpN3prZXm_VhJU6BcZlw afp.google.com, Coup in Mauritania as president, PM arrested]][[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7544834.stm news.bbc.co.uk, Troops stage 'coup' in Mauritania]][[ http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hmqqO8XJixmimcunkNvDYctnppTgD92CO0CO1 ap.google.com, Coup under way in Mauritania: president's office]] In the apparently successful and bloodless coup d'etat, Abdallahi's daughter, Amal Mint Cheikh Abdallahi, said: "The security agents of the BASEP (Presidential Security Battalion) came to our home and took away my father."[[http://www&# 46telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandi ndianocean/mauritania/2509991/Mauritania-president-under-house-arrest-as-army-stages-coup.html telegraph.co.uk,Mauritania president under house arrest as army stages coup]] The coup plotters, all dismissed in a presidential decree shortly beforehand, included General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz
Muhammad Ould ‘Abd Al-‘Aziz, General Muhammad Ould Al-Ghazwani, General Philippe Swikri, and Brigadier General (Aqid) Ahmad Ould Bakri. [[http://www.themedialine.org/news/news_detail.asp?NewsID=22334 themedialine.org, Generals Seize Power in Mauritanian Coup]]
After the coup
A Mauritanian lawmaker, Mohammed Al Mukhtar, announced that "many of the country's people were supporting the takeover attempt and the government was "an authoritarian regime" and that the president had "marginalized the majority in parliament."[[http:// ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hmqqO8XJixmimcunkNvDYctnppTgD92CODDO0 ap.google.com, Renegade army officers stage coup in Mauritania]] The coup was also backed by Abdellahi's rival in the 2007 election, Ahmed Ould Daddah.
However, Ould `Abd Al-`Aziz's regime was isolated internationally and punished by diplomatic sanctions and the cancellation of some aid projects.
It found few supporters, among them Morocco, Libya and Iran, while Algeria, the United States, France and other European countries criticized the coup, and continued to refer to Abdellahi as the legitimate president of Mauritania.
A group of parties also coalesced around Abdellahi to continue to protest the coup, causing the junta to ban demonstration and crack down on opposition activists.
International and internal pressure eventually forced the release of Abdellahi, who was instead placed in house arrest in his home village.
The new government broke off relations with Israel, which it had recognized in 1999, during the Gaza invasion of late 2008/early 2009, which helped grant it some recognition in the Arab world and promises of Iranian and Libyan support.
Even so, the `Abd Al-`Aziz government appeared isolated and weak during the first half of 2009.
`Abd Al-`Aziz had since the coup insisted on organizing new presidential elections to replace Abdellahi, but was forced to reschedule them due to internal and international opposition.
However, during the spring of 2009, the junta negotiated an understanding with some opposition figures as well as international parties, which dramatically changed the situation.
Abdellahi formally resigned, under protest, as it became clear that some opposition forces had defected from him and most international players, notably including France and Algeria, now lined up behind `Abd Al-`Aziz.
The United States continued to criticize the coup, but did not actively oppose the elections.
Abdellahi's resignation paved the way for the Mauritanian presidential election, 2009
election of military strongman Muhammad Ould `Abd Al-`Aziz as civilian president, on July 18, by a 52% majority.
Many of Abdellahi's former supporters criticized this as a political ploy and refused to recognize the results.
They argued that the election had been falsified due to junta control, and complained that the international community had let down the opposition.
Despite marginal complaints, the elections were almost unanimously accepted by Western, Arab and African countries, which lifted sanctions and resumed cooperation with Mauritania.
By late summer, `Abd Al-`Aziz appeared to have secured his position and to have garnered widespread international and internal support, although several influential parties and political personalities, notably Senate chairman Messaoud Ould Boulkheir, continued to refuse the new order and call for `Abd Al-`Aziz's resignation.
Regions and departments
{{main
Regions of Mauritania
Departments of Mauritania}}
File:Central mosque in Nouakchott.jpg
thumb
200px
View of Nouakchott.
File:Chinguetti mosquee.jpg
thumb
Chinguetti mosque
Mauritania is divided into 12 regions (''régions'') called wilaya and one capital district in Nouakchott, which in turn are subdivided into 44 departments of Mauritania
departments (''moughataa'').
The regions and capital district (in alphabetical order) and their Capital (political)
capitals are:
{
class="wikitable"
!width="140px"
Region !!width="110px"
Capital |
Adrar Region
Adrar
Atar, Mauritania
Atar |
Al Khaima Appart-hotel
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