The Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs expressed its “deep disapproval” of an expected change in Paris’ language in a direction more favorable to Morocco’s interests.
A new bilateral crisis? The answer is far from obvious when reading the press release issued on Thursday, July 25 by the Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs expressing “the great regret and deep disapproval” of Algiers in the face of an expected change in the French position on Western Sahara. Using a veiled threat, the Algerian government affirms that it “will draw all the consequences that flow from this French decision and for which the French government alone assumes full and entire responsibility.”
The ministry’s text does not, however, specify the precise content of this “French decision” which was communicated to it in advance before it was made official later, probably during a visit by President Emmanuel Macron to Rabat by the end of the year. The press release simply mentions, in rather vague terms, ” unequivocal and unqualified support [from France] for the autonomy plan for Western Sahara within the framework of Moroccan sovereignty.”
For its part, the Quai d’Orsay refuses at this stage to communicate on the subject. Rabat too, but the Moroccan press is already openly congratulating itself on a development that it interprets in its way. “France supports the Moroccanness of the Sahara, Algiers is furious,” applauds the online newspaper Hespress, close to the palace.
Cyclical – with its regular alternation of rifts and reconciliations – the Franco-Algerian relationship should thus experience a new phase of tension but in proportions that are still uncertain. For nine months, French diplomacy in the Maghreb has been moving more and more clearly towards a rapprochement with Morocco, a country with which the crisis had been virulent from the summer of 2021 to the summer of 2023.
“Existential” question for Morocco
The Cherifian kingdom having made the recognition of its sovereignty over Western Sahara – a former Spanish colony disputed by the independence movement of the Polisario Front with the support of Algeria – the alpha and omega of its external relations, Paris necessarily had to amend its historical position to accommodate Rabat’s demands, failing to fully align itself with them.
Since 2007, France has “supported” the autonomy plan for this territory, put on the table by King Mohammed VI, but without expressly validating its “Moroccanness”, as the Cherifian kingdom demands, to take into account the resolutions of the United Nations Security Council which still devote – at least on paper – Western Sahara to “self-determination”. A recalibration of French doctrine on the subject is, however, in the air.
During his visit to Rabat on February 26, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, Stéphane Séjourné, announced it unambiguously: ” France knows that the question of Western Sahara is existential for Morocco and for all Moroccans. We have said it and I say it again today, perhaps with more force. It is now time to move forward, and I will personally ensure this.” While waiting for a semantic breakthrough on the subject, France gave the green light to the establishment of companies in Western Sahara, a strong symbolic gesture.
The step taken that day was considerable: it was the first time that a representative of Paris recognized the “existential” character of Western Sahara for Morocco. The signal could only worry Algiers, whose relations with Rabat have been broken since 2021, precisely because of this Sahrawi dispute.
Algiers wants to protect the future
Through its warning on Thursday, the Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs anticipates the budding change in Paris with the ulterior motive of discouraging it or at least limiting its scope. A calculation that seems to indicate that things are not set in stone at this stage.
The terms of the Algerian reaction are rather temperate, sparing the future. In any case, they contrast with the tone of the previous bilateral crisis triggered in February 2023 by the reception in France of Amira Bouraoui.
The journalist, who has dual French-Algerian nationality, had fled Algeria, where she was banned from leaving the country, via Tunisia thanks to the consular support of Paris. Algiers then recalled its ambassador stationed in Paris, while the official agency Algeria Press Service (APS) castigated “the French secret agents” who “are seeking a definitive break with Algeria” . We are not there yet.
But Algiers is marking the blow a priori through costless warnings, waiting to see what the definitive terms of the future French position on Western Sahara will be. How far will Paris go in reformulating its assessment of the Moroccan autonomy plan of 2007? Until now, its official doxa was to consider that this plan of Mohammed VI was “a serious and credible basis” for a discussion to resolve the conflict.
“The serious base”
A pioneer in 2007, its position had not changed, whereas since December 2020, following the recognition of the “Moroccanness” of Western Sahara by the United States – Donald Trump was then at the end of his mandate – Morocco had obtained a change from certain European countries deemed favorable to its interests.
Spain in particular, under pressure from Morocco on the migration issue, had conceded that the royal plan was “the most serious and credible basis” for discussion, using the excellent marking a qualitative leap. At the very least, France could move from the indefinite article to the definite article by replacing “a serious basis” with ” the serious basis” to express a more complimentary description of the Moroccan plan.
More than a break, it would be a return to the language already used by Alain Juppé, Minister of Foreign Affairs under the presidency of Nicolas Sarkozy, who had stated during a visit to Rabat in March 2012 that the royal plan, “Today the only realistic proposal on the table”, constituted “the serious and credible basis of a solution”. The formula was then abandoned by French diplomacy with the arrival at the Elysée of François Hollande a few months later.
