The Diplomat in Spain

The minister with Wert, García Tejerina and Piqué before the conference./ Picture: TD

Eduardo González. Madrid

Yesterday, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, José Manuel García-Margallo, warned that “the only solution” against jihadist terrorism “is the military victory”, because “dialogue with movements aspiring to exterminate the adversary is not possible”.

Jihadist terrorism is “the most serious global phenomenon in recent times, we are all threatened”, the minister declared during a conference at the New Economy Forum in Madrid, attended by the ministers of Education and Culture and of Agriculture and Environment, José Ignacio Wert and Isabel García Tejerina; the former ministers of Foreign Affairs Josep Piqué and Trinidad Jiménez, the secretary general of the World Tourism Organization (WTO), Taleb Rifai; and the ambassadors of countries such as Brazil, France, Japan, Hungary, Belgium, Serbia, Algeria, Egypt, Guatemala and Palestinian Authority, among others.

Margallo made these statements a day after his participation in the Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the EU (CAE), where he announced before the press that Spain had offered to host a meeting of the European Union with the countries of the South Neighbourhood, including Syria, to deal with the regional response to jihadism.

The jihadist groups, according to Margallo, “do not aspire to correct the current model, but to replace it completely”. Therefore, in his opinion, in the fight against the Islamic State and Al Qaeda, the only solution is the military victory, since dialogue is not possible with a movement whose only objective is to exterminate its adversaries”.

The military fight, according to the minister, must be accompanied by other aspects, such as the eradication of poverty, the end of “frozen conflicts that serve as a cause or as an excuse for the rivalry between the West and the Islamic countries”, and the ideological debate through the Alliance of Civilizations, “redefined in view of the current events”. Therefore, Margallo warned about the need for the fight against jihadism not to turn into “a fight between the West and the Islamic countries, which must be the main figures” in this process.

Afterwards, in response to the journalists’ questions, the minister of Foreign Affairs said that Ceuta and Melilla are a “transit point” giving combatants who have been to Syria and Iraq to fight and then have come back, which means a threat for the West. Therefore, he asked the European Union to make an “effort”, because it is “its obligation”, to monitor the border of the two autonomous cities with Morocco, facing the advance of jihadist terrorism and other challenges.

[hr style=”single”]

The minister affirms that Spain wants to lead the negotiation process with Cuba 

[hr style=”single”]

During his speech, Margallo was “confident” that the president of the United States, Barack Obama, will officially visit Spain before his mandate concludes, although he warned about the excessive “media interest in presences or absences” of the world leaders, as it happened in the recent Ibero-American Summit with the presence of Cuba’s President, Raúl Castro.

As regards the relations with Cuba, Margallo stated that Spain wants to lead the negotiations of the EU with that country and that it could contribute its “experience” in the process of transition towards democracy. The minister was convinced that the process of economic opening to the United States that the island will be forced to go through because of the crisis of Venezuela and of Petrocaribe “will necessarily be accompanied by a political opening”.