Marina Pina Madrid

Madrid

Updated Tuesday, February 13, 2024-01:34

  • Relations Algeria postpones Albares' trip 12 hours in advance, which meant the normalization of relations

  • Migrants More than one hundred immigrants, 40 minors, enter Ceuta irregularly, risking their lives in the middle of the Karlotta storm

Spain is the southern border of NATO and the European Union, the last allied territory before coming face to face with the Maghreb. This objective fact is the argument that the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, frequently uses to highlight the importance of relations with North Africa, especially with

Morocco

and

Algeria

. The first, for being our main trading partner and neighbor at two land border points; and the second, for being a supplier of 23% of our gas. However, despite the efforts of the head of Spanish diplomacy, these two countries frequently demonstrate that the relationship is not between equals, and that they rule in their negotiations with Spain.

The latest example of this was the cancellation last Sunday night of the visit that Albares was going to make to Algiers. The trip represented a staging of the normalization of relations that were

broken on March 18, 2022

after the change in Spain's position on the Sahara. As EL MUNDO has learned, it was Algeria that insisted on announcing the trip, an agreement that is part of the diplomatic negotiations for the visits. Thus, after specifying that point, on Thursday the two Ministries of Foreign Affairs made public the minister's tour in a brief statement. Once the meeting was closed, diplomacy was launched to finalize details of the agenda. Albares was going to meet with his counterpart,

Ahmed Attaf , and a meeting with the country's president

Abdelmadjid Tebboune

was negotiated

, although it did not come to fruition. Visas were also processed for more than a dozen journalists who would accompany the minister.

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Exteriors.

Algeria postpones Albares' trip, which meant the normalization of relations, 12 hours in advance

  • Editor: MARINA PINA

Algeria postpones Albares' trip, which meant the normalization of relations, 12 hours in advance

In parallel to these diplomatic organization works, immigrants from Morocco began to swim to the beaches of Ceuta. Thus, from early Friday morning until yesterday morning, more than

150 swimming attempts

were recorded , affecting both bays of the city. EL MUNDO has confirmed the Government's indications that these entries may be a response from Morocco in protest of the rapprochement with Algeria, its historical enemy. However, on Monday morning, when the Albares trip had already been cancelled, the Moroccan gendarmes left with a boat to pick up two young migrants who were swimming near the breakwater in Benzu, returning to Belliones beach, reports

Antonio Sempere .

.

Unexpectedly, at eight o'clock on Sunday afternoon, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced in a brief note that the trip was postponed "for reasons of the Algerian agenda." That it was Algeria who insisted that the trip be made public and they who postponed it shows that Spain has

more political will

to resolve the situation than the Maghreb country. In fact, right now the figures support Algiers' superiority in relations. As EL MUNDO has known, the relationship between the Ministries has been complicated for some time. Thus, Foreign Affairs spent the first quarter of 2022

closing a visit

by the Algerian

Ramtane Lamamra

, Albares' counterpart at the time, to Spain. Lamamra postponed that trip on several occasions, which was completely scrapped after the change in Spain's position on the Sahara and the withdrawal of its ambassador in Madrid on March 19, 2022.

Algeria

then suspended the friendship treaty

with Spain, froze national imports and, although it guaranteed the supply of gas, Italy became the preferred partner in the negotiation of this matter. In addition, the frequency of flights between Madrid and Algiers decreased. These two years of silent negotiations have achieved steps to return to the point where relations were: on January 14,

Spanish exports

of poultry products were authorized, and on February 5, those of red meat. But when Albares' visit for a new departure point was imminent, Algeria put other priorities on its agenda.

In Morocco the operation is the opposite, although it also serves to verify that they have the superiority in the negotiations. The Alawite kingdom has agreed to several meetings with Spain. Sánchez was even invited to Mohamed VI's table to celebrate an iftar, the moment of breaking the fast during Ramadan. And they signed a document full of triumphs on paper. Which included the creation of a customs office in Ceuta for the first time and the reopening of the one in Melilla. However, and despite the fact that Albares frequently speaks with his counterpart,

Naser Burita

, Spain has not yet achieved normalization in customs crossings. In his last visit to Rabat, Albares was unable to set a date for the normalization of trade exchanges and alluded to "technical issues" in Morocco so that they did not occur. As in the case of Algeria, it is the country of Mohamed VI that decides when and how he makes deals with Spain.

Foreign sources do not consider the meeting with Algeria lost, but rather postponed. And other diplomatic sources consulted by this newspaper assure that "if there is political will, a visit can be organized from one day to the next." Although, at the moment, Algeria

has not found a date

for the meeting and Spain hopes that the trickle of immigrants to the beaches of Ceuta will decrease.