Laayoune: Information from Answers.com Mobile

Laayoune

City (pop., 2004: 183,691), Western Sahara, northwestern Africa. The capital (1940 – 76) of the former Spanish Sahara and (since 1976) of the Laâyoune province of Morocco (though Morocco's claim is not internationally recognized), Laayoune lies in the northern part of Western Sahara, 8 miles (13 km) inland from the Atlantic Ocean. It was developed by Spain in 1938 as the administrative and military centre of the Europeans living in Spanish Sahara. It is Western Sahara's largest urban centre, and it has been a major site of Moroccan infrastructural investment, including the construction of housing and a large desalination plant.

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