Marrakech – Portugal does not believe the late July mass entry of migrants into the occupied city of Ceuta posed an “immediate threat” to the European Union’s Schengen area of free movement, and it has pointed to Morocco’s “really very impressive” efforts to contain illegal immigration, according to the country’s foreign minister, Paulo Rangel.
“We can say there was no immediate threat to Schengen right as it happened,” Rangel said in a Saturday interview on the sidelines of the Ambrosetti Forum in Cernobbio, near Milan. He described the position as a long-standing one, noting that Portugal and France, as Spain’s neighbors, “would have suffered the first impact.” Bloomberg relayed his comments.
Tens of thousands of migrants crossed into the occupied city from Morocco on July 30-31, prompting Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni to impose border checks with Spain. Madrid responded with reciprocal checks on travelers arriving from Italy.
The Schengen exposure was limited by an existing rule. Although Spain belongs to the passport-free zone, travelers departing Ceuta must already undergo identity checks before continuing to the rest of the bloc.
Rangel described Madrid and Rome as “friends” and expressed confidence that “this small tension” would be resolved soon. He confirmed that his government backs Meloni’s call for a meeting of EU interior ministers, even though Lisbon did not sign the declaration by European leaders demanding emergency talks on Ceuta.
Portugal tracked the situation “hour by hour,” both receiving and providing information throughout, Rangel explained, crediting Morocco’s efforts to hold back the migrants.
The three countries are preparing to jointly host the 2030 FIFA World Cup, and in April signed a trilateral memorandum strengthening cross-border judicial cooperation through 2030, including coordination against transnational crime and other security challenges surrounding the tournament.
Rangel’s remarks also come as Spanish media outlets, among them elEconomista and El Español, renew discussion these days of a separate Portugal-Morocco file: a direct electricity interconnection between the two countries, which elEconomista cast as an electrical “bypass” of Spain amid the current tensions over Ceuta.
According to those reports, Lisbon and Rabat have agreed to revive the long-stalled project and to request financing from the European Commission. The link would carry roughly 1 GW of capacity across about 220 kilometers of submarine cable, connecting Tavira in Portugal’s Algarve with Beni Harchane in northern Morocco. Cost estimates have ranged from around €650 million to the €800 million calculated in 2018.
The initiative advanced in July, when Portuguese Environment and Energy Minister Maria da Graça Carvalho and her Moroccan counterpart, Leila Benali, agreed to reactivate it and seek EU backing.
In August, the two countries’ grid operators, REN and ONEE, received a mandate to prepare a preliminary proposal on construction and financing within six months, with a working group of three representatives from each side meeting monthly.
For Rabat, the project would open a second direct gateway to the European electricity market. Morocco is currently linked to the European grid through the Iberian Peninsula via two 400 kV cables with Spain, and a third connection agreed in 2019 has yet to materialize.
