Morocco says Spain backs its designs on Western Sahara

 
INA-sources
 
Spain announced a major shift in policy Friday, endorsing a Moroccan plan for an autonomous Western Sahara region under Rabat's rule in what Madrid called the beginning of "a new phase in relations."
 
Madrid says this new phase will be "based on mutual respect, the completion of agreements, the absence of unilateral actions and the permanent transparency of communication."
 
The announcement comes at a low point in relations, with Morocco seeking recognition of its sovereignty over the region, and Spain attempting to limit fallout from an incident that drew Rabat's ire last year.
 
Rabat's plan for disputed Western Sahara region
The royal palace in Rabat said Friday that King Mohammed VI had received a letter from Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announcing Madrid recognizes "the importance of the Sahara issue for Morocco," and that "Spain considers the autonomy initiative presented by Morocco in 2007, as the most serious, realistic and credible basis for settling the dispute."
 
The plan envisions autonomy in Western Sahara, which Rabat has regarded as its own since annexing it when Spain abandoned its former colony in 1975. But the Algerian-backed Polisario Front independence movement wants the region to be a sovereign state for the ethnic Saharawi people.
 
The UN, which still recognizes Madrid as the colonial administrative power in Western Sahara, had previously proposed a Spain and EU-backed plan for a referendum to settle the decades-old dispute.
 
The shift in policy comes in the wake of a serious diplomatic spat sparked when Madrid allowed Polisario Front leader Brahim Ghali to travel to Spain for medical treatment last year. Rabat reacted by allowing upwards of 10,000 people to cross its border into the Spanish North African enclave of Ceuta, creating a humanitarian crisis.
 
Rabat also recalled its ambassador to Madrid and has yet to reinstate her. 
 
The neighboring countries, separated by the Straits of Gibraltar, have extensive trade relations as well as working closely on migration, defense and energy issues. Spain Friday said the two sides sought to confront "common challenges" together, "especially cooperation in the management of migratory flows in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic."
 
Source: DW