The relationship between Algeria and Morocco continues to deteriorate amid the conflict in Western Sahara. The two neighboring countries are still at loggerheads.
After denouncing the “actions of the Moroccan colonizer” in Western Sahara Thursday in Moscow, Algeria expressed reservations on a resolution of Parliament in favor of Morocco, Saturday in Cairo.
The Arab Parliament, meeting in emergency session Saturday, June 26 in Cairo, rejected the European Parliament’s resolution of June 10 condemning Morocco’s use of migrants as a lever of pressure in its diplomatic crisis with Spain.
In the Moroccan press, it is not so much this support of Arab parliamentarians that make the event, but the reservations presented by Algeria. Another pretext for the Moroccan media to attack the neighbor to the east in chorus.
On June 10, the Strasbourg Parliament adopted by a large majority a resolution condemning the Moroccan authorities following what happened in May in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, and to a lesser extent in that of Melilla.
“(The European Parliament) rejects the use by Morocco of unaccompanied minors, as a means of political pressure on a Member State of the Union, deplores in particular that children, unaccompanied minors and families have crossed the road massively. The border between Morocco and the Spanish city of Ceuta, thus putting their lives and their security clearly in danger,” reads the resolution.
Between May 17 and 19, between 8,000 and 12,000 migrants, mostly Moroccans, including many unaccompanied children, literally invaded the Spanish enclave of Ceuta. It was clear that the Moroccan border surveillance services let it happen and the Spanish authorities said so openly. A paradox when we know that, as the Spanish journalist Ignacio Cembrero recalled in a recent interview with TSA, that Morocco “is the first country in the South of the Mediterranean which receives aid from the European Union and which also receives millions of euros to fight the irregular emigration arriving in Spain”.
“Since the end of 2018, Morocco has received more than 340 million euros solely to improve the efficiency of the control of its borders and its coasts. And apparently, it was not very effective,” notes the journalist.
A mix of genres that has no place
In a press release published on Saturday, June 26, the Council of the Nation (Senate) which represented Algeria at this meeting said it had “expressed reservations on paragraphs of the draft resolution concerning the Moroccan-Spanish dispute.” He stressed the need “to put the institutions of common Arab action aside from issues that can be resolved in a bilateral framework and to promote the role of the PA in the defense of Arab issues and hopes.”
In Morocco, we are still raging against the EP and for two days against the position of Algeria. “Algeria is still characterized by its hostility towards pathetic Morocco,” writes eg 360.ma. Or again L’Opinion considers that Algeria has revealed “ts duplicity”.
Even some voices in the Arab Parliament have been raised to deliver lessons to Algerian diplomacy, as did Jordanian deputy Gill Attia for whom the Arab Parliament denounced foreign interference in the ” internal ” affairs of an Arab state. As a result, Algeria’s reserves are irrelevant. Except, it’s not quite that.
Last December, the Bureau of the Arab Parliament sided with Algeria, condemning a European Parliament resolution adopted in November and denouncing the human rights situation in Algeria.
There is a mixture of genres and the comparison is not quite timely, because in the case of Algeria, it was indeed an internal matter and even some Hirak militants had denounced what ‘they considered ” interference “. This is not the case with the diplomatic crisis between Morocco and Spain. This is tension between two sovereign states.
In addition, many observers stress that Algeria’s position was predictable when we know the motivations of Morocco and the trigger for the crisis. Even the European Parliament says it in its resolution: the Moroccan authorities have used blackmail against migrants following the hospitalization in Spain of the President of the Sahrawi Republic.
“The crisis was triggered by Morocco due to a political and diplomatic crisis after the leader of the Polisario Front, Brahim Ghali, affected by the coronavirus, was admitted to a Spanish hospital for humanitarian reasons,” wrote the EP.
A truth that even the Moroccan authorities do not hide. The EP recalls in this sense that the Moroccan Minister of Foreign Affairs “recognized that the massive entry of thousands of people, including children, resulted directly from the fact that the leader of the Polisario Front had been welcomed in Spain, that, in an official statement published later, the Moroccan authorities indicated as a real reason the position considered ambiguous of Spain on Western Sahara”.
Knowing the strong positions of Algeria on the question of Western Sahara, its diplomacy could not change its mind by condemning without reservation a text which denounces such turpitude.
Chanegrina denounces the Moroccan “actions of the colonizer”
The day before the Algerian “veto” in the Arab Parliament, Lieutenant General Said Chanegriha, Chief of Staff of the National People’s Army (ANP), seriously accused Morocco during the 9th Conference on International Security which took place in Moscow.
He denounced the Moroccan “actions of the colonizer” aimed at “annexing the Sahrawi territories with force”, before warning against the consequences of this policy on security in the Maghreb.
” This worrying situation marked by the military upsurge and foreign interference could fuel tensions throughout the region,” warned the chief of staff of the ANP.
