The diplomatic pulses that Morocco has won

Morocco has been waging a diplomatic battle for months with Germany and especially against Spain because of Western Sahara.

In March he suspended contacts with the German Embassy in Rabat and in May he withdrew his ambassador from Berlin.

Both Spain and Germany have been in favor of finding a solution in the Sahara conflict "mutually acceptable" for the parties and within the framework of the UN.

But that answer does not satisfy Rabat.

In principle, Morocco seems the weakest part of the crisis.

However, the Royal Palace, which is the one who orders the policy of its diplomacy, has become accustomed in recent years to raise great pulses in the international sphere.

And he has won almost all of them, except for the assault on the Spanish island of Perejil in 2002. Here are some of those sets.

More information

• The crisis between Spain and Morocco worsens after a harsh crossing of statements by Western Sahara and the borders

Against Spain.

In August 2018, Rabat closed the Beni Enzar commercial customs post, bordering Melilla, without the slightest protest from Madrid. In June 2020 the Kings of Spain visited all the communities of the country after the state of alarm except the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla so that the southern neighbor, which considers them “occupied prisons”, would not feel aggrieved. In January of that year, Morocco validated two laws to expand its demarcation of territorial waters. In all these matters, Spanish diplomacy limited itself to ensuring that relations were excellent.

The latest has been the arrival by swimming of 8,000 migrants to Ceuta. A knowledgeable source from Morocco, who prefers to remain anonymous, indicated: “With this pulse Rabat has been wrong. The investments that some large companies of the Ibex were considering, these have already been lost. And it seems that Rabat has assumed that cost ”.

Against the US

In April 2013, under the presidency of Barack Obama, the US delegation to the United Nations tried to incorporate a human rights monitoring system into the UN Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO), the the only peacekeeping mission that lacks a human rights mandate. The monarch then ordered the cancellation of the joint military maneuvers with the United States known as the African Lion, scheduled for that month of April in the north of Western Sahara. The end of the crisis was staged seven months later, with the reception of Mohamed VI in the White House. Ironies of history, in its fight against Washington the support that Morocco received from France and… from Spain was decisive.

Samir Bennis, Morocco's diplomatic adviser in Washington and founder of the

Morocco World News

site

, which usually broadcasts positive news for the country's image in English, believes that Morocco's “strong political projection” has to do with the importance it plays in the security "not only of the European Union", but of the world in general; in irregular emigration, drug trafficking or terrorism.

Bennis believes that what Spain has not understood is that the US needs Morocco to strengthen its position in Africa. And he predicts that his diplomatic influence will be even more decisive in the future, thanks to the "growing economic role" promoted in sub-Saharan Africa by Mohamed VI in the last two decades. This Moroccan councilor recalls that the country has 70% of the world's phosphate reserves and is the leading exporter of this material, key as an agricultural fertilizer. He augurs that, with the growth of the world's population in coming decades, "Morocco will be to the world what Saudi Arabia has been to oil."

Against the Polisario Front and its great protector, Algeria.

Morocco has managed to get the UN to erase the word referendum from its resolutions since it presented its autonomy proposal for Western Sahara in 2007. Every battle won at the UN is a victory over Algeria, since it is this country that defends the interests of the Polisario Front, which has no representation in the United Nations.

Haizam Amirah Fernández, a researcher at the Elcano Royal Institute, questions that all these crises have resulted in a victory for Morocco. "Have these pulses given Morocco what it really wants, which is the worldwide recognition of its sovereignty over the Sahara?" He asks. Amirah Fernández concludes: “Four of the five members of the UN Security Council still do not recognize Morocco's sovereignty over the Sahara. Today, it does not seem that Donald Trump's decision to recognize Moroccan sovereignty over the Sahara has been a turning point. And in return, all these pulses in which Morocco has played very hard have left a residue that does not benefit its image as a partner ”.

Against France.

Mohamed VI suspended security collaboration with France when the country's most powerful policeman, Abdelatif Hamuchi, was about to be tried in Paris on charges of torture. That February 2014, four French judicial police officers appeared at the residence of the Moroccan ambassador in Paris. France ended up announcing that it decorated Hamuchi with the order of Officer of the Legion of Honor after suffering a year of information blackout on terrorist matters. Hamuchi was never again charged with torture. Three months later, the National Assembly approved an agreement whereby the complaints filed in France against Moroccan citizens accused of committing crimes in Morocco are sent "with priority" to Rabat even though the victims are French.

Khadija Mohsen-Finan, a professor at the Paris 1 university and a specialist in the Maghreb, believes that Morocco's great advantage is that neither the UN nor the EU condemn its attacks on human rights. He adds that Rabat's "unpunished" behavior is reminiscent of Israel's. “Now that the two countries have normalized their relations, they support each other. They both scoff at international law. " The professor considers that in the case of the European Union this "impunity" is flagrant. "Despite the fact that the Strasbourg Court declared (in 2018) that Western Sahara does not belong to Morocco, the EU re-negotiated the fisheries agreement with Rabat (in 2019) and granted it better conditions."

Against Sweden

. In September 2015, the civil government of Casablanca stopped the opening of the Ikea furniture store on the outskirts of the city - its first establishment in the Maghreb, with 27,000 square meters and an investment of 40 million euros - under the pretext of that the Swedish company was missing a “certificate of conformity”. However, the real reason was that the Swedish Social Democratic Government planned to recognize the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) as a state.

After almost three months of boycott, the Swedish government withdrew its project.

The “recognition” of the independence of the Sahara “would not help in that process.

The situation in Western Sahara differs from that of other states that Sweden has recognized in the past ”, declared then the Swedish Minister of Foreign Affairs, Margo Wallström.

The Ikea store was opened in Casablanca.

All the pulses that Morocco won lasted for months: three, in the case of Sweden, and one year in that of France.

But none of them activated an international smear campaign like the one that Rabat has suffered after the arrival of 8,000 irregular immigrants in Ceuta, many of them minors.

Nor had they been openly accused with the word that always floated in the air and no Western politician dared to pronounce: blackmail.