Algeria has requested approval to appoint a new ambassador to Spain, thus reestablishing full diplomatic relations that had been interrupted since, on March 19, 2022, it recalled the previous head of its legation in Madrid, Said Moussi. as government sources have confirmed to EL PAÍS. The new Algerian representative in Madrid will be the diplomat Abdelfetah Daghmoum, former ambassador of his country in Guinea Conakry, who was already assigned as number two at the Algerian Embassy in Madrid, as advanced The confidential.
The return of the Algerian ambassador closes a diplomatic crisis of more than 19 months that has had as its main consequence the practical suspension of exports of Spanish goods to Algeria, with million-dollar losses for the affected companies, in sectors such as oil, paper or ceramic products.
The call for consultations by the Algerian ambassador occurred a day after the Moroccan Royal Palace distributed the letter that the President of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez, addressed to King Mohamed VI, in which he described the Moroccan autonomy project for Western Sahara. as “the most serious, realistic and credible basis for the resolution of the dispute” over the former Spanish colony. The letter sealed the reconciliation of Madrid with Rabat and allowed the return to the Spanish capital of the Moroccan ambassador, Karima Benyaich, after ten months of absence, which culminated with the entry of more than 10,000 irregular immigrants into Ceuta in May 2021.
However, the reconciliation with Rabat triggered the immediate opening of a new diplomatic crisis with Algiers, the main ally of the Polisario Front, which considered the turn of the Spanish Government as “a second historic betrayal of Spain to the Sahrawi people”, after the Madrid agreement. of 1975, which left the former colony in the hands of Morocco.
In the case of Algeria, it will not be the previous ambassador who returns, since Said Moussi was appointed ambassador of his country to France in August 2022, so Algiers has opted for another diplomat who is familiar with the Spanish reality. The Spanish Government has already received the mandatory request for approval for his appointment, which will be processed as quickly as possible, according to the sources consulted, so his incorporation into the Embassy in Madrid could occur shortly.
Three months after withdrawing its ambassador, Algeria suspended the Treaty of Friendship, Good Neighborhood and Cooperation between the two countries, signed two decades earlier, and blocked financial transactions with Spain, strangling bilateral trade, leading the Minister of Foreign Affairs Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, to request the intervention of the European Commission, responsible for commercial relations with third countries.
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Although Algeria has fulfilled its gas supply commitments, through the only gas pipeline that remains open (the Medgaz, an underwater tube that connects Almería and Beni Saf), Spain has sought alternative suppliers and the Algerian authorities have privileged Italy as its best customer in energy matters, to the detriment of the Iberian Peninsula. They have even launched a new project, South2H2, to bring green hydrogen to Germany through the transalpine country and Austria, competing with H2Med, promoted by the governments of Lisbon, Madrid and Paris.
During the time that the Algerian Embassy has been vacant, Spanish exports to Algeria have plummeted, with falls of up to 45.9% in 2022 (from 1,888 million euros to 1,021) and 90% in the first half of this year. anus. Furthermore, Spanish companies have been excluded from public works tenders in the Maghreb country and its authorities have suspended the repatriations of immigrants who arrived irregularly on the Spanish coast, who until the crisis broke out were returned by the Ministry of the Interior in the ferry that covers the Alicante-Oran line. In recent times, however, there have been some signs of detente, such as the reestablishment of regular flights by the Air Algérie company from Palma de Mallorca to Algiers, on October 29, which predicted a more flexible position in the Algerian position.
The change in attitude refutes the thesis that Minister Albares had become an obstacle to the normalization of bilateral relations for not having informed the Algerian authorities in advance of the Spanish Government’s move towards the Sahara. The PP’s criticism of this change, and the way in which it occurred, had also raised the expectation that a new Government chaired by Alberto Núñez Feijóo could retrace the path taken and return to the traditional equidistance between the positions of Algeria and Morocco on the Sahara, a possibility frustrated by the electoral results of 23-J. Finally, Algiers has decided not to wait for the constitution of the new Government to move forward and fully restore political relations, although it remains to be seen if these lead to the immediate normalization of economic relations.
The Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs has not wanted to confirm or deny this information and neither has the Algerian Embassy in Madrid responded to EL PAÍS’ requests to give its version.
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