The former head of Spanish diplomacy Arancha Laya Gonzalez gave a long interview to a Spanish media known for its animosities towards Morocco where she took this platform to deliver the substance of her thoughts around the plan of self-determination, going as far as ‘to place the Palestinian cause and the Sahara conflict in the same boat.
Revenge is a frozen dish, seems to think Arancha Gonzalez Laya, the former Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs at the time of giving her consent for this long interview granted to this Spanish media, whose anti-Morocco position is no longer proven.
Not vengeful for a penny, the current dean of the Paris Schools of International Affairs (reporting to Sciences Po Paris), seized, on the fly, this pole held out by El Independiente to launch all the barbs that she has carefully kept since she was ousted, unceremoniously, by Pedro Sanchez.
“ The big lesson of what is happening right now in Gaza is that we thought we could resolve the conflict between Israel and Palestine by first resolving the conflict between Israel and its neighbors, leaving the Palestinian side aside for later (…) In the case of the Sahara and other conflicts in the world, what we must understand is that we must resolve the problem at the source, and that is the lesson to be learned,” says t- her, pretending to ignore the position of the Moroccan authorities regarding this parallelism.
Questioned about the role of her country in resolving this dispute, Laya returned to the charge to pin her former boss, Sanchez, around his alignment with the Moroccan position, believing that Spain must be able to support all the efforts of the Secretary general of the United Nations and his special envoy, “that’s his role,” she insists.
While repeatedly rehashing this miraculous solution proposed by her, namely “return to the source”, the negotiation expert listed a range of proposals that stands out for its…ineffectiveness. “There are different proposals on the table and any solution accepted by the parties will be the right one. From the outside, what we can do is help, accompany, encourage, and perhaps contribute, but we cannot replace the conflicting parties, whatever the nature of the conflict,” she suggests.
On the subject of the relations that his country should maintain with Morocco and Algeria, the response of the former Spanish diplomat suggests to what extent his mandate was anything but a walk in the park.
“We know that we live in a difficult and fragile neighborhood (…) We are aware of this and we always want to have the best relations with our neighbors. But a relationship is not only what we want, but also what others want,” she says to cleanse herself of any suspicion of tropism.
Before pulling himself together: “In any case, I can say that throughout my long professional career, I have had the pleasure of knowing these Spanish neighbors well and of maintaining excellent relations with them, but I am also aware that friction is sometimes inevitable. »
A late mea culpa?
