legality of the fisheries deal between Morocco and the EU?

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Fight over legality of EU fisheries in Western Sahara

afrol News, 7 March

- This week, the legal experts of the European Union (EU) are to
present their conclusion on the legality of the fisheries deal between
Morocco and the EU last year, which includes the waters of occupied
Western Sahara. Protests by the exiled Sahrawi government, activists
and Sweden, Denmark, Britain and Ireland had cast doubt on the
legality. Moroccan ally France and Spain, which gains most on the
deal, favour the treaty as it is.

In July last year, negotiators from the European Commission (EC) and
Morocco finally agreed on the terms for a new four-year fisheries
treaty, allowing EU vessels to resume fishing in the rich Atlantic
waters of Morocco for the first time after 1999. The deal was smaller
than the previous 1995-1999 treaty and excluded Morocco's
Mediterranean waters. But nevertheless, 119 EU vessels - 95 of them
Spanish - were allowed to return to Moroccan waters as of March 2006,
promising relief for the troubled European fisheries industry.

Meanwhile, the March 2006 deadline has been reached but EU vessels
still are unable to trawl Moroccan waters. The fisheries agreement has
yet to be ratified in the European Parliament and in the EC, where it
meets resistance from a growing number of members of the EU parliament
(MEPs) and national governments.

When announced, the deal immediately caused protests from the exiled
Polisario government of Western Sahara, whose territory has been
occupied by Moroccan troops and settlers since 1975. The EU's chief
negotiator had made it clear that Western Sahara's rich waters were
considered part of the deal as they were "under Moroccan
administration." This view runs against a legal ruling by the UN in
2002, which concludes that Morocco is not the administrative power of
Western Sahara.

Polisario and pro-Sahrawi activists soon gained the support of the
Swedish government, which publicly opposed the deal as contradicting
international law because it opens for exploitation of the natural
resources in an occupied territory. The Stockholm Foreign Ministry for
the last half year has been lobbying in other EU capitals to gather
enough votes against the deal in the EU parliament and in the EC to
block ratification. A minority of sufficient countries or sufficiently
big countries is enough to block the deal.

The Swedes have managed to rally for support in several leading EU
countries. At recent meetings in the EU's fisheries commission, the
representatives of Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland and the United
Kingdom have voiced concern over "the legality" of the inclusion of
Western Sahara in the deal. The Italian and Austrian governments are
reported to be drifting towards opposition. Further, the anti-deal
campaign finds support from individual politicians and MEPS from
almost all EU member states, including Spanish MEP Raúl Romeva
(Catalan Green Party).

But also the pro-agreement block has gained ground since the issue
surfaced. France has vehemently defended the deal, not surprisingly,
as Paris is Rabat's main political ally in the Western Sahara
conflict. Spain, the ex-colonial power and often seen as the
territory's legal administrative power, supports the deal but Madrid
keeps a lower profile. After all, the government of José Luis Zapatero
is seeking friendly ties with Morocco and is the main beneficiary of
the fisheries deal.

Most EU parliamentarians and national governments silently support
them for economic or strategic reasons - favours from Madrid and Paris
will be expected in change when these countries see their economic
interests threatened. Keeping record of favours given each other is
the order of the day among the divided nations of the EU.

The pro-Moroccan block argues that both EC-Moroccan fisheries
agreements in the 1990s had included Western Sahara. The negotiators
from the EC still claim that the deal is within international law, as
"the people of Western Sahara" also will have economic benefits from
the treaty. Parts of the euro 144 million the EU is to pay Morocco is
to be spent locally on the development of "the Moroccan fishery
sector", thus favouring local fisheries communities along the coast,
including in occupied Western Sahara.

The Swedish government does not accept this argument. Fisheries
Minister Ann-Christin Nykvist told the national press that the EU
funds to be spent locally would probably not benefit Sahrawis, who are
mostly exiled or marginalised within the new Moroccan settler economy
in the occupied territory. The fisheries sector in the Western Sahara
towns of El Aiun and Dakhla is in the hands of Moroccan investors and
labour is recruited among the many thousand settlers Rabat sent into
the territory after 1975 to change its ethnic composition.

While Sweden leads the resistance to the EU-Moroccan fisheries
agreement, neighbouring Denmark has led the diplomatic efforts to find
a solution to the dispute splitting the EU. Danish Fisheries Minister
Hans Christian Schmidt, while opposing the deal, avoided an uncertain
vote in the EU parliament and the EC by contributing to have the
agreement analysed again by the juridical services of the EC. Denmark
had "demanded assurances from the EC on the ... legality of the
accords with regard to international law," Minister Schmidt told the
Copenhagen parliament last month.

The EC's legal offices are expected to hand down their judgement on
the legality of the treaty on Thursday this week. Most European
observers expect the legal experts to approve of the deal, on
condition that funds are directed to the territory's population. Given
the differences over who is the legal population of the territory,
however, the opposition to the treaty may continue its efforts to
block the deal at the EU parliament or the EC.

If the legal experts deem the treaty illegal, it will not be ratified
as it is, but an amendment must be negotiated. The EU thus will have
to look to Washington on how to define its economic ties with Rabat.
The US, which is also a major ally of Morocco, in 2004 signed a free
trade agreement with the Kingdom that clearly stipulated that the
territory of Western Sahara was not included in the treaty. According
to US Congress members Joseph Pitts and Donald Payne, the EU should
not find it difficult to define equal limits.

By staff writers

(c) afrol News

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Source: http://www.afrol.com/articles/18349