The Diplomat
NATO did not clarify yesterday, just two days before the start of the Madrid Summit, whether Ceuta and Melilla will remain under the umbrella of its collective defense clause, despite the enthusiastic claims of the Government and the PSOE in this sense.
During a press conference in Brussels dedicated to the Summit to be held on June 29-30 in Madrid, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg yesterday dodged any pronouncement on the possibility of Ceuta and Melilla being covered by the Atlantic Alliance umbrella in the event of an external attack.
“The Article Six of the Washington Treaty defines the geographical scope of our collective defence guarantee, Article Five, and it defines it as the territory of any of the parties in Europe, or North America, or islands under the jurisdiction of any of the parties in the North Atlantic area, north of the Tropic of Cancer,” Stoltenberg explained. According to these words, Ceuta and Melilla would be excluded from this protection because they are in African territory, while the Canary Islands would be covered because they are an island territory located north of the Tropic of Cancer.
“That said, I think we have to understand that the issue of invoking Article Five and our collective defence clause is a political decision. So it has to be taken by consensus, by all Allies in the North Atlantic Council, based ultimately on what would matter in that particular case,” he continued. In statements to Cadena COPE, the Deputy Assistant Secretary General for NATO Public Diplomacy, Carmen Romero, assured yesterday that “NATO protects all States”, including Spain, but specified that the invocation of the collective security clause would be “a political decision”.
Hours before, the spokesman of the Federal Executive of the PSOE, Felipe Sicilia, had assured in a press conference that the NATO Summit in Madrid “will give Spain the international role it deserves and thanks to which Ceuta and Melilla will be included for the first time under the umbrella of protection of the Atlantic Alliance”.
Last week, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, stated during a press conference in Moncloa, in relation to the possibility that the Summit will address the possible Moroccan pressures on Ceuta and Melilla, that Jens Stoltenberg “has said several times in recent times that every inch of allied territory is perfectly guaranteed by the solidarity of the Member States”.
Torrejón de Ardoz and IFEMA
On the other hand, the Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, visited yesterday the Torrejón de Ardoz Air Base to see the arrangements prepared for the entry and exit of the delegations attending the NATO Summit. The base will be the destination and departure point for around thirty NATO delegations and guests, including the largest in personnel and means from the USA and Turkey.
The vast majority of the delegations with Heads of State and Government will arrive between 14:00 and 20:00 today, to attend the dinner hosted tonight by the King and Queen of Spain at the Royal Palace. Other planes with foreign and defense ministers are expected mainly during the morning of June 29.
Likewise, the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, visited yesterday the Security Coordination Center for the NATO Summit, at the IFEMA Madrid Exhibition Center, where yesterday the “critical phase” of the security macro-device for hosting the meeting was activated. Two days before the start of the official agenda of the summit, NATO has taken over the management of Operation Eirene, under the command of the Police and with the participation of the Civil Guard, CNI, Municipal Police and emergency services.
