The Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation, José Manuel Albares, will travel to Morocco on May 11 to participate in the ministerial meeting of the coalition against the Islamic State, according to Europa Press.
The meeting is expected to take place in Marrakech, and will be attended by the heads of diplomacy of a dozens countries that make up the coalition, among whom is US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken.
Moroccan FM Nasser Bourita will also be at the meeting, as the representative of the host country, and a member of the counter-terrorist coalition Morocco has been part of since its creation in 2014.
Spanish media is unsure of “whether Albares will take advantage of his trip to Marrakech to hold a bilateral meeting with his Moroccan counterpart.”
A meeting between both head of diplomacy has been highly anticipated. For context, Albares was supposed to make an official work visit to Morocco, where he was scheduled to meet with Bourita, shortly after Spain’s shift on the Western Sahara file.
After Spanish President Pedro Sanchez held a phone call with Morocco’s King Mohammed VI, and announced a visit to the Royal Palace, Albares canceled his trip, as “its main goal was now irrelevant.”
Although the Spanish FM had accompanied his president to Morocco, and while various reports had confirmed a meeting between both Kingdoms’ FMs, the latter never happened.
Albares and Bourita have so far not held a bilateral meeting, although they have spoken on several occasions by telephone in recent months, to defuse tensions and paving the way for the resumption of bilateral relations.
The two foreign ministers are expected to play a key role in the coming months as it will be up to them to coordinate the working groups that will be set up in different sectors to address key issues for the two countries with a view to holding the postponed High Level Meeting (HLM), initially scheduled for December 2020, before the end of the year.
Both governments should finalize in the coming weeks the restoration of the movement of people and goods “in an orderly manner” and with “appropriate devices for customs control and people on land and sea”, as stipulated in the joint statement after the meeting between Sanchez and Mohamed VI, which includes Ceuta and Melilla, according to the Executive.
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