According to the Foreign Office they'd already reached a preliminary view that refurbishment was not a violation of the cease-fire in Western Sahara in 1998, after contacts with the UN mission Minurso "in the region".

BBC: News Online

UN's legal counsel told the Security Council that Morocco had no right to issue oil-exploration rights in Western Sahara without the consent of Western Saharans.

ECONOMIST: Budgeting for security

The Algerian Interior Ministry also said that 107 foreign workers and 685 local employees had been released, following the end of the hostage-taking by Islamist militants at the Western-run In Amenas gas facility, in the Sahara desert.

BBC: Algeria hostages: UK 'working hard' to find Britons

The Moroccans used them in the fighting and have now deployed them as their main weapon alongside the 900-mile sand wall, the "Berm" - that they constructed as a barrier between Western Sahara and the Saharawi camps in Algeria.

BBC: News Online

According to the Foreign Office, there were seven meetings here between 1st February 1999 and June 21st 1999, when the British team finally sent a telex back to the Foreign Office on an agreement they said they'd reached with the UN Department of Peace Keeping Operations - DPKO - and with Minurso, the UN mission in Western Sahara.

BBC: News Online

UN-monitored ceasefire, to be followed by a referendum on Western Sahara's future in 1992.

ECONOMIST: Western Sahara

In between our refusal and the hearing of the appeal, the United Nations in Western Sahara and in New York confirmed the refurbishment was within the terms of the cease-fire agreement and they were willing to supervise the refurbishment.

BBC: News Online