These are Sahrawi women, whose people have been fighting a 22-year battle to wrest their piece of desert from Moroccan rule. And in the rugged mountains of the Pyrenees, Basque separatists gather to discuss a new strategy - one which this time will involve negotiations rather than bombs. All three groups of people are prepared to risk their lives in order to win a country of their own. This is hardly surprising. The nation-state has become the main form of human political organization.
Nationalism can and does succeed - though the price can be very high.
More and more new countries are being born. The disappearance of communism alone created 20 new states to add to the existing 165 members of the United Nations. It would seem that our world is becoming increasingly fragmented into smaller and smaller nation-states, built around a common language, religion or creed. Motivations may vary, but in a world characterized by a 'crisis of ideologies', this resurgence of nationalism is hardly surprising. The demise of traditional belief-systems, including the communist one, has left a feeling of hopelessness and chaos.