<h6><strong>Eduardo González</strong></h6> <h4><strong>The People's Party (PP) Parliamentary Group in Congress has asked the government why the new Spain-Africa Strategy, presented last December, "omits the Sahrawi people and Spain's special connection with Western Sahara."</strong></h4> In an oral parliamentary question submitted on May 20 for debate in the Congressional Foreign Affairs Committee, MPs Carmelo Barrio Baroja, Carlos Floriano Corrales, and Carlos Rojas García asked the government to explain "why the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' Strategy 'Spain-Africa 2025-2028. Working together through a strategic relationship' omits the Sahrawi people and Spain's special connection with Western Sahara." The Spain-Africa Strategy 2025-2028, presented in early December by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, provides, among other measures, an increase in diplomatic deployment in the region and the expansion of Spain's diplomatic capacity with Africa through the establishment of a Subdirectorate General for West Africa and the Sahel within the Directorate General for Africa, the creation of an Advisory Council on Africa in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the establishment of an Interministerial Commission for Africa, a schedule of ministerial trips and visits to African countries and organizations, the reinforcement of Casa África, Casa Árabe, and Casa Mediterráneo, and the strengthening of the Spanish Cooperation Offices in West Africa and the Sahel. The nearly 100-page document makes no mention of Western Sahara. As Pedro Sánchez explained during the presentation, the new Strategy, unlike previous Africa Plans, has "a continental dimension," without country categories or priority partners, although it does pay "special attention" to the "immediate neighborhood: North Africa, West Africa, and the Sahel, not limited to sub-Saharan Africa, as reflected in the previous Africa Plans." Spanish policy toward Western Sahara took a sharp and unexpected turn in March 2022 with Pedro Sánchez's decision to endorse the Moroccan autonomy plan for the former Spanish colony, considering it "the most serious, credible, and realistic basis for resolving this dispute." This measure, which was rejected by the rest of the parliamentary spectrum, including the governing partners, allowed the extremely serious diplomatic crisis with Morocco to be overcome but has generated, among other consequences, numerous criticisms of the Spanish authorities for their apparent complicity with Rabat on human rights issues in Western Sahara. In these three years, the government has dodged all parliamentary questions related to the persecution of Sahrawi journalists and activists and the situation of asylum seekers from the former Spanish territory. Separately, last March, members of the PSOE (the government's majority partner) once again expressed their opposition to a bill by Sumar (the minority partner) to grant Spanish nationality to Sahrawis born before 1976, when the territory was still under Spanish administration. Last October, the Spanish government avoided any pronouncement on the decision by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) to annul the 2019 trade agreements between the European Union and Morocco, arguing that the people of Western Sahara had not been adequately consulted, despite the fact that they directly affected the resources of their territory. "We respect the decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union," declared the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, before the Foreign Affairs Committee of Congress.
