Casablanca – Postponed again, a much-anticipated Moroccan-Spanish high-level meeting in Morocco has been rescheduled for early 2023.
Morocco’s Foreign Affairs Minister Nasser Bourita announced the news during a press briefing on October 18 in Rabat on the occasion of the Morocco-EU green partnership signing ceremony, noting that this postponement would allow for “better preparation” of the summit.
“We will have enough time to prepare the parliamentary forum, the business forum, and the mobilization of all stakeholders in this relationship,” the Moroccan top diplomat stressed.
According to Bourita, the Morocco-Spain high-level meeting will be “an important moment that will reflect this positive state of mind, this state of mind oriented towards the fulfillment of commitments that animate the Moroccan-Spanish relationship today.”
The meeting, he added, will also aim to strengthen the new phase of relations between Rabat and Madrid triggered after discussions between King Mohammed VI and the President of the Spanish government Pedro Sanchez last April.
Read also: High Level Morocco-Spain Meeting Postponed Again Amid Silent Rift
The return to normal diplomatic ties between Morocco and Spain occurred after Spain’s historic foreign policy shift on the Western Sahara dispute, announced by Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez earlier this year.
Since then, a joint declaration has been signed between the two countries, allowing them to establish a new roadmap, on which “[Morocco and Spain] work together,” Bourita said.
For the Moroccan minister, the joint declaration “specifies the principles that define this new phase and helps define priorities and clarify positions on issues of interest to both countries.”
In addition, “working groups have been activated with many elements that have been implemented and all the commitments contained in the roadmap will be respected and achieved,” he emphasized.
The most recent high-level meeting between Morocco and Spain took place in 2019, before COVID-19 and the diplomatic crisis between the two countries.
