The border between Morocco and Algeria, which runs for about 1,600km, is one of the longest closed frontiers in the world. Algeria shut its land border with Morocco in 1994 after Rabat imposed visa regulations on Algerian visitors in the wake of a terrorist attack on the Atlas Asni Hotel in Marrakech. At the time,Morocco suspected Algiers was behind the bombing.
"Rabat expected Algiers to slap visa requirements on Moroccans, but the kingdom could not imagine that Algeria would also retaliate by closing the border crossings," Abdelaziz Rahabi, who served as the Algerian ambassador in Spain at the time, told Al Jazeera. "Algeria reacted firmly as the country was going through a rough patch. Actually, 1994 was one of the bloodiest years of the black decade [when a civil war raged between the government and armed groups]."
Since then, checkpoints, on both sides of the border, have been closed and controls tightened. The two countries marked the 20th anniversary of the closure of their common border this year by building a barbed-wire fence, starting from the beach, under the pretext of fighting both terrorism and trafficking. "It is expected to separate the entire frontier," a young guard, posted in Marsa Ben M'hdi beach, told Al Jazeera in an interview last month. So far, the fence stretches about 40km along the border.
Algeria turns 'deaf ear' to border dispute - Middle East - Al Jazeera English
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