Morocco is performing large-scale military maneuvers, set to last three months, near the coasts of Spain’s Canary Islands.
This may be related to the EU’s upcoming ruling on Moroccan annexation of the Western Sahara and its waters. (Recently, the Advocate General of the EU court in Luxembourg announced that it is preparing to rule on the EU-Morocco agreement, which includes the issue of Western Saharan sovereignty).
It seems to be a show of dominance in the waters between the Western Sahara and Canary Islands, where Spain and Morocco both have an interest in expanding their maritime border (especially given that they may be rich in rare earth minerals).
More specifically, it is a threat against Spain, presumably meant to pressure the Spanish government into negotiating on behalf of Morocco in the EU. Indeed, Spain’s current ruling coalition has reversed the country’s historic stance regarding its former colony, the Western Sahara, by accepting Moroccan claims on the territory. It has been suggested that this is due to PM Sánchez’ phone being hacked by Morocco using Pegasus spyware. This might be the case, but it’s also true that the Spanish Socialist Party’s (PSOE) trajectory has been one of gradual capitulation to Morocco since Rodriguez Zapatero’s first administration, beginning in 2004.
The regional Canarian government, for its part, expressed its unease at not having been consulted by Rabat regarding these military exercises. It was initially reported that the Canary Islands were not given notice, and that the Moroccan government had failed to respond to it when it reached out. Morocco did, however, publish the coordinates and the schedule its military vessels would follow, per standard practice in order to avoid accidents with fishing boats and ships.
In any case, the above represents an escalation in Morocco’s long-term aggressive stance towards Spain, and occurs in the context of ever-increasing illegal migration into Spain.
So far in 2024, Spain has received as many illegal migrants as Greece and Italy combined, as Ruben Pulido has documented. The Canary Islands are a key point of entry, one that may intensify with the looming Senegalese elections (political disputes in West Africa tend to increase migration flow into the Canary Islands). Morocco’s position has long been to facilitate the irregular flow of people from sub-Saharan Africa to Spain in order to thereby exert political pressure.
Given Morocco’s building animosity towards Spain, as evidenced by the current military exercises, and the already impressive uptake in African migration, it seems likely that 2024 will be a record-breaking year for illegal migration into Spain.
