Spain Considered Sending Polisario Leader to Portugal Before Secret Hospital Admission

The government of Pedro Sanchez planned to send Brahim Ghali, who was affected by Covid-19, to Portugal before giving up, preferring to welcome him on its territory under the borrowed name of Mohamed Ben Battouche, of Algerian nationality, reports Nusdiario. The Spanish and Algerian authorities had had the necessary time to study the evacuation of the Polisario leader. On April 16, Brahim Ghali had received respiratory assistance by intubation at the central military hospital in Algeria, where he had been admitted on April 13 for respiratory distress. He will be evacuated to Spain on April 18. A transfer studied in six days.

The Spanish Foreign Minister, Arancha Gonzales Laya, had supported this decision made by Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez (a tacit agreement with Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, note). Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska, on the other hand, had expressed his opposition to welcoming Brahim Ghali. Madrid finally agreed to host the separatist leader on its territory for "humanitarian reasons," thus provoking new tensions between it and Rabat. Tensions that are far from subsiding.