Western Sahara is one of the worlds few remaining major non-self governing territories. Moroccos control of the region is not internationally recognised and is disputed by the Polisario Front, an Algerian-backed movement that claims independence for the territory as the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR).

The Saharawis are Arab nomads who have roamed the Western Sahara for centuries. In 1975, Morocco invaded and drove the Saharawis into neighbouring Algeria. A guerrilla war, under the leadership of the Front, followed, until the UN brokered a ceasefire in 1991. Since then, a promised vote on independence has been stalled.

The conflict has produced generations of refugees. The UNHCR estimates that about 150,000 Saharawis are housed in camps amid the flat, stony wastes near the town of Tindouf in south-west Algeria. The refugees live in four Polisario-controlled camps where, Amnesty International reports: Freedom of expression, association and movement continue to be restricted. Subsisting on foreign aid consisting of rice, bread, and a few root vegetables, most suffer from chronic malnutrition. Meanwhile, there have been few studies of the culture of the Western Saharan people.

Aziza Brahim was in exile even before she was born. In 1976, her heavily pregnant mother fled to a refugee camp in Tindouf when Morocco annexed the land where she lived. Azizas family comes from El Aaiun, the capital of the former Spanish colony of Western Sahara. Aziza never met her father, who stayed behind in the occupied city.

At the age of 11, she received a scholarship to study in Cuba but left school when she turned 18 to pursue a musical career. Aziza has never forgotten her roots and she returned to the camps, not as a 19-year-old musical ingnue, but as a voice for the Saharawis, a people fighting for independence.

Aziza embodies the new voice of the Saharawis. Her songs evoke exile, the right to freedom and human rights. She dedicates all her songs to her peoples struggle. Her song titles are evocative: Peace, Son of the Clouds, The Battle of Guelta, Memory of the Tank, and Return, a tribute to the Saharawis pursuit of self-determination and independence. She has been nominated for an album of her songs, Mi Canto.

In her concerts, Aziza mixes her songs with speeches about Western Sahara. The music she plays is itself a revolution in terms of traditional Saharawi music. Mixing characteristic forms with rock, blues and African percussion, she tries to update the Saharawi rhythms and to make the music accessible to the whole world. Azizas music is censored by the authorities in Morocco and the Western Saharan zones because authorities believe it champions and celebrates those Saharawi people who have been tortured, killed or who have disappeared during the conflict.

Aziza can no longer visit the occupied zones she fears she may be jailed or tortured. She is considered, like many Saharawis, to be an enemy of the Moroccan government.