Marruecos avisa de que su embajadora en Madrid no volverá mientras Ghali siga en España

The Moroccan ambassador to Spain, Karima Benyaich, who was recalled for consultations last Tuesday to Rabat, "will not return while the crisis lasts, and the crisis will last while its real cause continues", which is the entry of the leader of the Polisario Front, Brahim Ghali, into Spanish territory "in conditions unworthy of a state of law" and his failure to appear before the Spanish justice system, the Moroccan Minister of Foreign Affairs, Nasser Bourita, pointed out on Thursday in an appearance before the press.

In the first reference by a Moroccan official to the migratory avalanche on Ceuta in recent days - 8,000 arrivals in 48 hours - Bourita stated that this wave was due to "a context of fatigue of the Moroccan police apparatus after the festivities of the end of Ramadan" but also to "the total inaction of the Spanish police", which according to him is deployed at a rate of one policeman for every one hundred Moroccan agents in the border areas.

Rabat warns of a "media hostility campaign" coming from Spain. It has also repeatedly deplored "the campaign of media hostility" by the Spanish media, both public and private, against Morocco by "mobilising all the media in unacceptable terms and sometimes involving high-ranking officials".

The Moroccan government does not yet consider the diplomatic crisis over Ghali's reception to be over, and on Thursday said it was waiting for "actions" that go beyond "pats on the back".

A senior Moroccan diplomat told le360.ma, considered to be close to the Palace of Mohammed VI, on Thursday, pending the publication of an official communiqué by the government explaining its decision to recall its ambassador in Madrid, Karima Benyaich, for consultations on Tuesday.

As the diplomat did before going to the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where she was summoned by Minister Arancha González Laya, this unidentified high-ranking official has made it clear that this is not a migration crisis related to the entry of thousands of migrants into Ceuta between Monday and Tuesday, but to the reception of Ghali.

"The crisis between Morocco and Spain is called Brahim Ghali and not Ceuta", he summed up, defending the fact that Rabat has not acted "out of emotion, but on the basis of tangible facts that put the strategic partnership between the two countries to the test"

Rabat claims that the decision to host Ghali was "premeditated" and recalls that it warned that it would have "consequences". "We have still not received an explanation or justification from Spain", this high-ranking official insisted, despite the fact that last week González Laya said that the "appropriate explanations" had been given to the Moroccan government, and has defended at all times that Ghali was taken in for strictly humanitarian reasons.

Despite the warning from Rabat, which in a statement on 8 May said that Ghali's presence in Spain would have "consequences" after criticising that it was not warned beforehand of this decision in a "premeditated" way, the Spanish government has persisted in its policy of ignoring Morocco and continuing to give shelter to the Polisario leader, who is receiving treatment for covid in a hospital in Logroño.

Moroccan diplomacy emphasises that "the migratory parenthesis is not the issue, it is an ingredient to remind us of the importance of the strategic neighbourhood". "The migratory parenthesis is not the issue, it is an ingredient to remind us of the importance of the strategic neighbourhood between Morocco and Spain", the senior diplomat pointed out, implying that the passage of more than 8,000 migrants to Ceuta would have been facilitated.

He insisted that the way in which Spain has acted is not in accordance with the "trust between two partners and neighbours", and for this reason Morocco is still awaiting a "legal response" in relation to Ghali, against whom there are cases pending before the Spanish justice system.

"The time in which a crisis with Morocco could be resolved with friendly pats on the back is a thing of the past", the Moroccan official warned. "Morocco expects Spain to act", he concluded.