The deaths come at a time when Moroccan authorities have intensified repression of Saharawis fighting for independence in the northwest African nation.

Media reports said the 12,000-tonne fertilizer carrier ship had come from Laayoune, Morocco. But, as Kamal Fadel, the representative of the Polisario Front to Australia, explained in a letter to the Australian, Laayoune is actually the capital of Western Sahara, a nation occupied by Morocco.

Polisario has led the 30-year struggle by the Saharawi people against the Moroccan regime, which invaded their country after they had won independence from Spain, the former colonial power. Fadel also explained that the ship was bringing phosphates illegally mined by Morocco in Western Sahara to Australia.

Moroccan police were deployed in force in Laayoune in the lead-up to the November 6 anniversary of Morocco’s invasion of Western Sahara. On October 29 Moroccan cops broke up an independence protest rally. Hamdi Lambarki, a 21-year-old Saharawi youth, was chased by the cops and beaten to death.

His death sparked a round of protests. Police responded by arresting a number of young Saharawis and also veteran human rights activist Brahim Dahane. There are currently 37 Saharawi political prisoners in Moroccan dungeons, arrested over the last year as part of the crackdown against an upsurge of pro-independence protests that began in May.  
 
 
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