The Ilecto flight from two European capitals to cities on the heavily contested North African territory has become the latest battlefield in rebels and Moroccan conflicts.
The low-cost airline has launched a route connecting Madrid and Paris to Dakura in the western Sahara.
Questions about the legality of flights pose a questionable future. The Polisario Front, which controls about 20% of the territory, is threatening legal action if European airlines maintain their routes.
For around 20 euros ($22), Virginia Santana can fly 3-hour weekly from Madrid to Dakura.
“This new route is revolutionary,” her 30s Spanish businessman told AFP at Madrid airport while waiting for a flight to Dacra.
Funded by Spanish investors, her hotel is a symbol of the city and surrounding area tourism boom, driven by Moroccan authorities, which strengthened territorial claims.
Morocco has since 1991 controls about 80% of the Western Sahara, which has been carrying out peacekeeping missions on what the United Nations consider to be “territories of non-self-questioning.”
The United Nations mission aims to prepare a self-decision referendum for fishing and phosphate-rich territories. However, Morocco refused to allow votes where independence was an option and the showdown was frozen.
Spain retreated from the western Sahara in 1975, but after decades of neutrality, in 2022, supported the proposal that Moroccan proposal would be given an autonomous status under Moroccan rule. France followed suit in 2024.
Encouraged by the incentives given by Moroccan authorities, Transbia, a subsidiary of Air France KLM, launched a flight in Paris Dacra, and Irish budget airline Ryanair began its flight from Madrid.
“The latest connections released will allow us to double the international capacity of Dakura Airport, with around 47,000 seats available in 2024,” Moroccan Tourism Minister Fatim Zafra Elmore told AFP.
Legal Imbroglio
The Polisario Front is opposed to flights. Representatives of the movement of Oubi Bouchray, a UN agency in Geneva, told AFP that legal action is possible.
Moroccan authorities “want to impose “fait” the “Occupation of the Western Sahara” by involving economic actors,” Buchaya said.
Territory contracts must be approved by the parties involved, and the airlines “operate outside of international law,” added Polisario's envoy.
The European Commission in December told Carrier that the EU Morocco Air Agreement “does not apply to the route that links EU member states with Western Sahara's territory,” he added.
However, Spanish Civil Aviation Authority AESA has argued that the 1944 Chicago Convention coordinates international air travel grants the “no recognition right” of national space, and that “outside consultation is not necessary.”
Airlines reject broken rules
Without further ado, Ryanair said that operations on the route “comply with all applicable aviation regulations.”
Transbia said all of its flights have been “verified by relevant authorities.” However, the operational license seen by AFP allows carriers to provide services to Morocco, raising issues of Western Sahara's contested status.
When contacted by AFP, the French Civil Aviation Authority DGAC introduced the issue to the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but it did not address it.
The flight line follows a dispute over a 2019 contract signed between Morocco and the EU over fisheries and agriculture in the western Sahara.
After a lengthy legal battle, European Union judges backed the Polisario front last year and nullified the agreement.
