The Government will intensify attention to the Maghreb after Trump’s victory

Luis Ayllón Donald Trump's victory in the United States will make the Spanish Government intensify its attention in terms of foreign policy regarding the Maghreb, according to expert observers of what is happening in the area, consulted by The Diplomat. Although, at no time, neither the current nor any other Government takes its eye off the situation in North Africa, the prospect of a change in the foreign policy of the United States throughout the next year, will make the Ministry of Foreign Affairs have to follow much more closely any movement. Trump's return to the White House will occur when Spain has not yet managed to fully normalize relations with Algeria, and that is a point that significantly affects the relationship with the Maghreb. The recent Algerian decision to lift restrictions on foreign trade with Spain has not been the result of an improvement in relations between Madrid and Algiers, but rather a tactical approach by President Abdelmajid Tebboune, who has eased the dispute with our country to punish France, because Emmanuel Macron has recognised the Moroccan status of Western Sahara. Relations between Spain and Algeria remain at a low point. Tebboune decided a year ago to send a new ambassador to Madrid, twenty months after having called the previous one for consultations, in protest at the change of direction given by the Government of Pedro Sánchez to the Spanish position in relation to the Sahara, which was one step less forward than Macron. However, since then, little progress has been made and the visit that José Manuel Albares was going to make to Algiers, at the end of last February, was postponed indefinitely by Algerian decision, given the insistence of the Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs on not addressing the Saharawi issue. And, as far as Morocco is concerned, the reality is that, despite Rabat's promises to reopen the commercial customs office in Melilla, which was unilaterally closed in August 2018, and to open a new one in Ceuta, this has not happened. Morocco committed to this at the High Level Meeting held on 7 April 2022 in Rabat, after Sánchez had sent a letter to Mohamed VI less than a month earlier, in which he pointed out that the Moroccan proposal for autonomy presented in 2007 was "the most serious, credible and realistic basis" for the resolution of the Sahara dispute. Albares went so far as to point out that the opening of the customs office would take place imminently at the beginning of 2023, but the reality is that this has not yet happened, without the Moroccan authorities having given any explanation. As a result, the situation for the minister is embarrassing, because, every time journalists ask about the matter at press conferences, his answers cannot be very enlightening about the reasons for the delay. And while this is the situation, experts believe that the return of Donald Trump to the Presidency of the United States may cause Morocco to take advantage of the situation to raise the bar of demands on Spain in relation to Western Sahara. The Republican magnate already recognized in December 2020, shortly before the end of his first term, Morocco's sovereignty over the former Spanish territory at the same time that Rabat normalized its relations with Israel. Now, Mohamed VI, with Washington and Paris openly on his side, can launch into demanding that the Sánchez Government go a step further and, among other things, for example, transfer to Morocco control of the airspace of Western Sahara, which has been carried out from Las Palmas since 1975. Another of Morocco's demands towards Spain would have to do with the opening of a Consulate in Dakhla, the former Villa Cisneros. Trump promised that the United States would open it, but did not have time to do so, and if he were to take up the idea now, perhaps Rabat could expect Spain to take the same step. However, in the case of Spain, this would be a significant step, for which the situation may not be ripe. It would be easier for our country to decide to open an extension of the Cervantes Institute in that city. In a parliamentary response in 2023, the Government acknowledged that the possibility of opening "an extension is being studied as long as a space is located that meets the ideal conditions for its purposes." More generally, Trump's return to the White House could leave Spain in a more complicated situation in the event of a dispute with Morocco, because the lack of harmony between the American president-elect and Pedro Sánchez is not the best thing that could happen. There are many doubts among experts about what Washington would do if there were any action to demand Ceuta and Melilla from Morocco or an incident such as that of the Perejil islet in July 2002, in whose resolution Colin Powell, the then Secretary of State of George W. Bush, intervened. However, Mohamed VI, who always has the lever of migratory pressure in his hand to try to force Spain's hand, will also have to gauge what his possibilities are in the new situation, even if he takes for granted the support of the new American Administration. In any case, the first months of 2025 could be very important for the future of the Maghreb, both for how the relationship between Morocco and Algeria develops, and for how our country's relationship with the two giants of North Africa will be affected.

Related Content

Peter Paul Rubens: spy and ambassador just for the love of art

British Cemetery in Madrid: the final resting place for “heretic” diplomats

Rubén Darío, Nicaragua’s Ambassador to the Spain of Alfonso XIII

History of Piotr Potemkin and the first Russian embassy in Spanish history

British agent “M”... was born and died in Spain?