On 14 July MINURSO hoisted the national flag of France at the Team Site Mahbas  where one of the French female military observers in the Mission is posted [link to photo gallery].

France has been member of the United Nations since its founding in 1945 and holds a permanent seat on the Security Council. The country is the sixth-largest contributor to the peacekeeping operations budget and the second largest troop contributor among the permanent Security Council members.

« Bastille Day » is the common name given in English-speaking countries to France's national day celebrated in commemoration of the storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789, a fortress-prison in Paris where political prisoners were detained. It had come to illustrate the French Republic’s will to defend fundamental values of Human Rights.