ولاية تندوف
He lived in exile in the Sahrawi refugee camps in the Tindouf Province of western Algeria. According to some former members of Polisario now aligned with Morocco, Abdelaziz was "chosen" by Algeria at the top of the organization although he did not belong to the very closed circle of the organization's founders and "he always considered himself to be their man." Under Abdelaziz, Polisario continued its guerrilla war against Morocco and Mauritania, until the latter's withdrawal in 1979 and the construction of the Moroccan Wall in 1980s. With the wall limiting attacks, Abdelaziz turned to diplomatic measures to secure SADR's future.