Morocco and Spain on the watch for an EU Committee meeting on the fisheries agreement

The Morocco-EU fisheries agreement signed, Monday, in Brussels is still to be examined by MEPs. The meeting, dedicated to the treaty concluded in July by Morocco and the European Commission, will be held on the 23rd of January, indicates the Committee on Fisheries’ draft agenda published on the European Parliament’s website.

Discussions at the European Parliament will focus on the «implementation protocol thereto and an exchange of letters accompanying the said agreement», stressed the same draft agenda.

The meeting will mainly look into the adoption of draft report written in November by French MEP Alain Cadec who is also a member of the Union for a Popular Movement. «The European External Action Service (EEAS) and the European Commission have conducted consultations with the local population of Western Sahara and with the interested parties», said the same source.

«The majority of interlocutors spoke in favor of a new fisheries agreement and for the renewal of the protocol. The latter stressed the positive impact of the partnership on the development of local economic activities in the fisheries sector», the same source added.

The EU-Morocco Association agreement

Next week’s meeting will be largely dependent on the vote of the European Union plenary session to be held on Wednesday, January the 16th. The latter is expected to decide on the amended articles (1 and 4), which plan to extend tariff preferences to products originating from Western Sahara in the framework of the EU-Morocco association agreement.

The vote will give MEPs the green light for approving the fisheries agreement. While Morocco and Spain are awaiting Wednesday’s session, «representatives of Sahrawi civil society in Morocco and in the Tindouf camps» sent a letter to the European Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs, Taxation and Customs Pierre Moscovici, protesting against the proposal to extend tariff preferences to products originating from Western Sahara.

This letter was sent after Sahrawi political actors in the regions of Dakhla-Oued Eddahab and Laayoune-Sakia El Hamra called the European Union to renew the agricultural and fisheries agreements with Morocco, «highlighting the impact of these agreements on these regions' development and how their populations benefit from natural resources».