12.ª RAN a Discount: Summit of EU gendarmes and oppressors of the Saharawi people
during the days 1 Y 2 February, A new edition of the High Level Meeting will be held (RAN) between Spain and Morocco. They will try to advance an agenda for diplomatic reconciliation, strengthen the border repression of the imperialist bloc, carry out million-dollar deals and continue with the looting and oppression of the people in the Sahrawi territories. The LIS supports the demand for self-determination of Western Sahara and promotes the unity of the people mobilized against the oppressors and exploiters.
Partners with swings
The Kingdom of Spain and the Kingdom of Morocco arepartners strategic with complex relationships. They held their last summit in 2015 and they projected the following one for 2020, but Morocco unilaterally suspended it. Unrest was brewing that led to a crisis in April 2021, when Spain humanitarianally welcomed the Sahrawi leaderBrahim Gali, to be treated for Covid-19 in a hospital in Logroño. Morocco found it inopportune for Spain to receive Gali at a time when it was seeking international support for its plan for Sahrawi autonomy under Moroccan sovereignty.. The estrangement lasted for more than a year and ended the position of the Spanish Foreign Minister, Arancha González Laya.
Reconfiguration of relationships
Reconciliation began to take shape when Pedro Sánchezabandoned the historical Spanish position for self-determination and supported the autonomous solution of the invaders. In april 2022, Pedro Sánchez and Mohamed VI staged the new stage of relations with a friendly meeting in Rabat. Thus, The PSOE-Unidas Podemos “progressive coalition” government aligned itself behind the US governments. UU., Germany and France that expressed their consent to the autonomous plan presented by Mohamed VI.
The Spanish turn was questioned in Congress and repudiated in the streets of the main Spanish cities, in which solidarity mobilizations with the Sahara were carried out. Faced with the new situation in the Maghreb, Algeria expressed its political unrest and reduced trade with Spain by a 90%, without disturbing the gas supply.
More repression and business in common
The rapprochement has multiple manifestations. Moroccan security forces fully resumed their role as gendarme on the EU's southern border. In Melilla, with Spanish connivance, They murdered at least 37 people. During 2022 They increased repression on African migratory routes that pass through Moroccan territory on their way to Spain (Canary Islands, Strait of Gibraltar and Andalusian Mediterranean coast) strangling the flow of people in a 26%. Trade relations also regained momentum, approaching the 10.000 million euros annually.
Complicity in international forums
In the last Universal Periodic Review (UPR41) from the UN, Most speakers avoided pointing out Moroccan failure to respect human rights.. And in the European Parliament, The PSOE voted against a motion that pointed toQatar and Morocco responsible for bribery to MEPs in exchange for projecting a good image of their countries. The former socialist minister and current MEP, Juan Fernando López-Aguilar referred to this attitude openly: “You have to swallow toads if necessary”.
From political gestures to sealed agreements
Before the start of the RAN, Mohamed VI and Pedro Sánchez had a telephone conversation predicting the success of the meeting, although it was not confirmed whether the Moroccan king will receive the Spanish president. According to previous announcements, the large delegations of ministers and businessmen who will accompany President Pedro Sánchez and Prime Minister Aziz Ajanuch, They will try to sign around twenty agreements and a joint declaration. They will address issues such as: police cooperation on immigration, the customs opening schedule in Ceuta and Melilla, strengthening economic relations and awarding infrastructure projects. For the Spanish authorities: “We are laying the foundations to move towards a definitive fit that overcomes periodic and recurring crises”.
With one eye on the EU and the other on the elections
TheSánchez summits and all their politics have a binocular vision. With one eye he looks at the application to become one of the leaders of the EU, in which Spain will assume the rotating presidency in the middle of the year. And with the other eye he looks at the complicated panorama that he will face in the internal elections towards the end of 2023, before which he flirts with right-wing sectors hostile to the self-determination of peoples and African migrant people.
A town that stands
Morocco's diplomatic achievements are based on the complicity of imperialist powers, of the UN and a serious betrayal of the Arab peoples: recognition of the State of Israel in exchange forpolitical support, financial and military. Whatever, They have not managed to subdue the Sahrawi people and the young people who continue to demand the Self-Determination Referendum, although theMINURSO try to bury him.
At the same time, according to the publication Ecsaharaui, the XVI Congress of the Polisario Front (FP), held in January 2023, decided to intensify the war for the recovery of the occupied territories. He renewed plans to improve the educational and social bases that strengthen the unity of the people, elected the leaders for the next period and once again placed confidence in Brahim Ghali as secretary general of the Polisario Front and president of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic(SADR).
Free Sahara, a just cause that requires support
The 12th RAN is a reprehensible instance because its objectives are: toughen border repression, resume the rhythm of"Hot returns" that violate human rights, execute millionaire business negotiations and advance the anti-Sahrawi autonomy plan. The International Socialist League (LIS) complaint violation of human rights, calls on the people of the world to support the Sahrawi cause and promotes the unity of the mobilized African and Arab peoples. The claim for the right toself-determination of Western Sahara and Palestine is inextricably linked to the mobilization for a fundamental exit: that the workers and the people govern in a socialist system.
