Spain Mobilizes Response to Morocco’s Economic Blockade of Ceuta and Melilla

Against the economic blockade that Morocco wants to impose on them, the leader of the Popular Party (opposition), Pablo Casado, as well as the officials of the two cities, have discussed the issue at length with the head of government, Pedro Sanchez.

This meeting comes after the one organized by the president of the city of Melilla, Juan Imbroda, and his counterpart from Ceuta, Eduardo de Castro, in a palace in Malaga to develop a common strategy against the economic blockade decided by Morocco in August 2019, reports the daily Al Ahdath Al Maghribia. For the two officials, these restrictions have reached their peak last week with the ban on access to Ceuta of several tons of fish that Morocco was delivering daily to the city’s market.

Among other decisions, the top official of Ceuta wants to convince the President of the central government, Pedro Sanchez, to take the necessary measures "not to mortgage the city and, by ricochet, make its future dependent on decisions taken on the other side of the Tarajal borders". As for the participants in the Malaga meeting, they have asked the central government to provide the two cities with the necessary means to cope with the crisis. They also proposed to harden the Spanish position by imposing a visa on all Moroccan citizens, including the inhabitants of "Grand Tétouan" (Tétouan, M’diq and Fnideq) and Nador.

Moreover, these officials threaten to respond firmly to the multiple unilateral attempts to close the borders. For the same daily, these threats presage a "hot war" on the two border posts; a war whose first victims will be the people who frequent these crossing points. In the absence of any dialogue between the two countries, tension continues to mount around the two border posts, as the Moroccan government has blocked the passage of travelers, including Moroccans living abroad and Moroccans from Ceuta.