MEPs reject challenge to Morocco fishing deal

Group of MEPs wanted European Court of Justice to rule on whether agreement complied with EU and international law.

MEPs have rejected a plan to challenge the legality of a controversial EU fishing deal with Morocco.

MEPs voted 302 to 221, with 30 abstentions, to reject a bid to ask the European Court of Justice to rule on whether the agreement complied with EU and international law.

A group of 80 MEPs, led by Raül Romeva i Rueda, a Spanish Green MEP, and Andrew Duff, a UK Liberal MEP, filed a motion earlier this month to demand a review by the ECJ.

But MEPs from the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) and many centre-left MEPs from the Socialists and Democrats (S&D) voted against the initiative.

Duff said the group of MEPs wanted the legal review “to test the compatibility of the agreement with our treaty obligations to respect international law”.

Alain Cadec, a centre-right French MEP and vice-chair of the Parliament’s fisheries committee, said a legal review would “risk interrupting fishing opportunities” for EU fleets. “This accord is important for the European fleet,” he said, adding that it allowed fishermen from 10 member states to fish in Moroccan waters.

Liberal and Green MEPs argue that the accord, which came into force in 2007, violates international law.

They say that because the deal includes disputed waters claimed by the independence movement for the Western Sahara, the EU is indirectly supporting Morocco’s claim to Western Sahara, which has been under Moroccan control since the end of Spanish colonial rule in 1976.

They also claim that the European Commission, which negotiated the accord, failed to consult MEPs properly during the negotiations.

Romeva i Rueda said today’s decision “reflects badly on the European Parliament and its role to defend democracy and basic rights”.

The deal gives a fixed payment of €144 million to the Moroccan government in return for permission for EU vessels to fish in its waters. In July, member states backed a Commission recommendation to extend the deal by one year after the accord’s four-year term expired in February. They approved the extension despite a failure by Morocco to prove that the deal benefits the occupied territory and the Sahrawi population in Western Sahara.

The Parliament’s fisheries committee is currently drafting the Parliament’s position on the fisheries agreement with Morocco. A vote on the agreement is expected in November.

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