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Concerned about the future of the draft fisheries agreement signed between Morocco and the European Union, the Spanish government sent its Minister of Agriculture on the 12th and 13th of November to Strasbourg.
For two days the Spanish minister Luis Planas attended a couple of meetings in the European Union institution. On Monday, Spain’s former ambassador to Morocco met the President of European Parliament Antonio Tajani and Karmenu Vella, the European Commissioner for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries.
On Tuesday, Planas met Spanish MEPs who are also members of the Agriculture and Fisheries Committee, said the ministry.
The Spanish minister highlighted his country’s interest in maintaining the agreement, especially for fishermen in the regions of Andalusia, Galicia and Islands in Moroccan waters.
«I had a positive response from MEPs», he said told reporters, says EFE. «They asked me many questions about the legal framework of the agreement», added the minister.
The socialist group and the Polisario
While Spain sent its Minister of Agriculture to the European Parliament’s seat in Strasbourg, the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats, the political group in the European Parliament of the Party of European Socialists (PES), invited the «Speaker of the Polisario’s parliament».
Khatri Addouh, arrived in Strasbourg on Tuesday and met with members of the European Parliament and its various commissions on the EU-Morocco fishing agreement.
Khatri Addouh is expected to meet Socialists on Wednesday, November the 14th. His visit aims to «reiterate the position of the Polisario against attempts to circumvent the judgments of the Court of Justice of the European Union that has ruled on the inapplicability of trade agreements between the EU and Morocco», wrote SPS.
Khatri is also expected to held talks with Udo Bullmann, member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany, part of the Party of European Socialists. He will meet far-left MEPs and environmentalists, known for being close to the Polisario.
These visits come as the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development at the European Parliament (EP) adopted, on Monday night in Strasbourg, a favorable opinion for the renewal of the agriculture agreement between Morocco and the European Union (EU).
This favorable opinion was voted by the majority of the members of the committee and reflects the position of the political groups represented therein in favor of the adoption by the European Parliament of this agreement which aims at extending trade preferences to agricultural and fishing products from Morocco’s southern provinces.
