The Convention concerning the State frontier line established between the Islamic Republic of Mauritania and the Kingdom of Morocco was signed at Rabat on 14 April 1976. Plenipotentiaries: Hamdi Ould Mouknass and Ahmed Laraki, ministers of state for foreign affairs. Authentic text: French. It entered into force on 10 November 1976 by the exchange of instruments of ratification, also at Rabat, under Article V. Registration with the UN Secretariat, Article 102 of the Charter: 9 February 1977, UNTS No. 15406, volume 1035. It is not the Madrid Declaration of Principles of 14 November 1975, which the preamble invokes.

The preamble refers to the International Court of Justice advisory opinion of 16 October 1975, which recognised legal ties of allegiance, not a title of sovereignty over the territory, and to the Jemaa consultation of 26 February 1976. Article I defines the line as a straight line from the Atlantic coast at the 24th parallel north to the intersection of the 23rd parallel north and the 13th meridian west, then along Mauritania's existing frontier to the point on the initialled annexed map. Article II extends the line to airspace and the subsoil; the continental shelf is delimited by the 24th parallel north. Map coordinates are not transcribed here as a demarcation handbook.

Articles III and IV establish a Moroccan-Mauritanian Mixed Commission for marking the frontier on the ground and provide for a marking instrument to be annexed. Article VI requires registration with the United Nations upon entry into force. The convention is not a treaty with Spain and is not the Algiers Agreement of 5 August 1979, by which Mauritania later relinquished its claims to the territory. The United Nations continues to treat Western Sahara as a Non-Self-Governing Territory and does not recognise annexation as title.

The parties are Mauritania, under President Moktar Ould Daddah, and Morocco, under Hassan II. The convention is bilateral; the Polisario Front and the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, proclaimed in 1976, are not parties. Subsequent military operations are not transcribed here.

The register source, an academic article on the United States role in 1975, is not the instrument. The official text is the United Nations Treaty Series. Cover: the royal palace in Rabat, the city of signature; no claim is made to the hall. Wikimedia Commons, free licence.

Sources consulted: Western Sahara partition agreement; Convention concerning the State frontier line (UNTS 15406).