The coastline of Senegal from the Gambian border in the north to the
border with Guinea-Bissau in the south is remarkably smooth,
interrupted only by a few local bays and the Riviere Casamance (see
Fig. 5.12). Presumably, most of these bays and the Riviere Casamance
could be legitimately closed under other Convention provisions without
resort to Article 4 (LOSC Article 7). The baselines drawn,
however, even though they conform to the direction of the coast, are
invalid per se. Numerous small islands seaward of the baseline,
however, were excluded as basepoints by Senegal. Thus, the violation
in this area is somewhat conservative compared to the more abusive
straight baselines established north of the Gambian border (see Fig. 5.22 below). There, baseline segments are utilized to enclose large but shallow indentations which do not qualify for internalization.
