New Spain-Africa Strategy foresees raising embassies number and reopening Libya’s office

Eduardo González The 'Spain-Africa Strategy 2025-2028. Working together through a strategic relationship', presented last Thursday by the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, at the La Moncloa Complex, provides, among other measures, an increase in diplomatic deployment in the region, including the reopening of the Embassy in Libya, which was reopened in 2021 but has very limited activities and is temporarily serving from Tunisia. The Strategy also proposes the reinforcement of working mechanisms on Africa within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The document, of almost one hundred pages, provides for the expansion of diplomatic capacity with Africa from Spain itself through the launch of a Sub-Directorate General for Western Africa and the Sahel within the General Directorate for Africa, which will be in charge of promoting bilateral relations with the countries of the subregion and with ECOWAS and other regional organizations and of designing proposals and initiatives adapted to their particular conditions. This sub-directorate, which joins the existing one for Eastern, Central and Southern Africa, was created on November 28 by the Council of Ministers, within the framework of the Royal Decree restructuring the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The plan also provides for the creation of an Advisory Council on Africa in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs made up of African personalities of recognised prestige from the broadest professional sectors and with representation from all cultural, geographical and linguistic areas of special interest to Spain. At its annual meetings, the Advisory Council on Africa will transmit expectations and demands, and will also receive information on the policies developed by Spain with its African partners. To promote inter-ministerial coordination, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will promote the creation of an Inter-ministerial Commission for Africa that will meet twice a year at the level of ministers, chaired by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and quarterly at the level of State secretaries, chaired by the State Secretary for Foreign and Global Affairs. This Commission will monitor the implementation of this Strategy and address any proposals for its revision that may be necessary. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs will also propose a schedule of ministerial trips and visits to African countries and organisations, at least quarterly, in order to maintain a sustained and balanced dialogue with African partners, especially with the countries of North Africa and West Africa. In preparing these trips, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will continue to gather diagnoses, priorities and expectations from companies, cooperation agents and civil society organisations with interests in the country in question. The role of the Africa Roundtable will be strengthened as a forum specifically dedicated to dialogue between the Administration and non-governmental organisations, the private business sector and the scientific and academic sphere. It will be more involved in the development of specific initiatives and proposals, in particular those involving different actors in civil society. The Strategy also provides for the creation of a Foundation to promote relations with Africa and with a special focus on employment and educational opportunities for young Africans. This new foundation will work to create a Hispanic-African space of knowledge and will be a tool of public diplomacy whose objective will be to achieve better mutual understanding between Africa and Spain. Furthermore, the Diplomatic School will appoint a person in charge of cooperation with Africa and will schedule training activities on African issues in which the staff of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs itself assigned to posts related to Africa will participate. This training will focus on the priorities defined in this Strategy, both in its bilateral, European and multilateral aspects. In its field, the Diplomatic School will continue its dialogue with its African counterpart institutions to carry out collaboration programs of mutual interest. The Strategy also provides for the strengthening of Casa África, Casa Árabe and Casa Mediterráneo and the promotion of synergies between these three institutions of Spanish public diplomacy and proposes the designation of a focal point for African affairs in certain Spanish embassies located in non-African countries. Field deployment Regarding field deployment, the Strategy recalls that, since the launch of the first Africa Plan in 2006, Spain has been “strengthening its presence in West African countries with the opening of new embassies, diplomatic antennas and Spanish cooperation offices in 10 of the 15 ECOWAS States, including a Cervantes Centre and an Aula”. For the new period 2025-2028, the text proposes the reinforcement of institutional deployment in Africa with the opening of new embassies and the creation of new diplomatic antennas and new sectoral offices, including those of Spanish Cooperation. This reinforcement also includes a new headquarters for its Embassy in Nigeria and the reopening of the Embassy in Libya. The Spanish Embassy in Libya was closed in 2014 due to the civil war, as were most of the embassies of other countries, which left the country and followed the situation from Tunisia. Spain reopened its diplomatic representation in Tripoli in July 2021, on the occasion of a visit by Pedro Sánchez and in a show of support for the National Unity Government, but, at present, the activities of the Embassy in Tripoli have been limited and matters relating to this representation are being temporarily handled from Tunisia, according to the Embassy itself. It will also be proposed to reinforce the Spanish Cooperation Offices in West Africa and the Sahel, so that it can assume a regional function that allows it to expand its work to countries such as Guinea Bissau and Gambia. A similar reinforcement of the Spanish Cooperation Offices in Nigeria will also be studied to increase bilateral work with Nigeria, Ghana or the Ivory Coast, particularly in the area of financial cooperation, and in Ethiopia. The plan also includes the reinforcement of the Spanish Cooperation Office in Senegal, the reopening of the Spanish Cooperation Office in Tunisia and the development of a new Cooperation Strategy in Africa. Within the aim of increasing the participation of relevant actors with greater ties to the continent, as well as the business, academic, sports and civil society worlds, the Strategy advocates the creation of Council Foundations between Spain and leading African partners similar to those already existing with other countries.

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