00:00Ceuta has, once again, exposed the fragile and often complicated relationship between Spain and Morocco
00:06and raised much bigger questions for the European Union.
00:10For Madrid, cooperation with Rabat is essential to controlling one of Europe's most sensitive external borders.
00:17But when migration becomes part of a diplomatic dispute, how vulnerable does that make Spain and the EU?
00:25Joining me now to discuss this is Arantxa González-Laya, a former Spanish foreign minister under Pedro Sánchez.
00:31Good morning, ma'am.
00:33Good morning, Stefan.
00:35So, Ceuta has, once again, become the focal point of a confrontation between Spain and Morocco.
00:41Has Spain been too dependent on Morocco to control one of its borders?
00:46Well, first I would say, in order to characterize the situation, is a hybrid attack suffered by Europe,
00:54in its external border.
00:56This external border happens to be in Spain.
00:58But if we want to characterize the situation, is an attack on an external border of the European Union,
01:04using humans, using migration as a tool.
01:08So, migration is the tool.
01:11The objective is, and let's be very clear about that also, to weaken Spain, and through that, to weaken the
01:19European Union,
01:20at the time when the European Union is going through a lot of electoral process,
01:26at the time when there are questionings in the European Union, including from political parties within the European Union,
01:33and where migration is a sensitive social issue.
01:36So, I would say, let's start there, so that we understand how the European Union can help protect better
01:43this external border of the EU, which happens to be in Ceuta, Spain.
01:50So, when Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez broke decades of official neutrality to endorse Morocco's autonomy plan
01:58for Western Sahara in 2022, many labelled it a policy of appeasement.
02:04Well, that appeasement obviously failed during the Ceuta crisis in July.
02:09How can Madrid reset its relations with Morocco?
02:14I think it's important that we take this as European Union relations with the neighbour.
02:21And to me, you know, Europe must have the best relationship possible with its neighbours.
02:28Whether it's the neighbours in the south, whether it's the neighbours on the east,
02:32some neighbours lend themselves better to a more cooperative approach, and some are more difficult.
02:38But the starting point has to be to have, as best as possible, a relationship with European neighbours,
02:44because this, at the end of the day, would be good for the stability of Europe.
02:48But in the specific case of Spain, I think there's two things that we need to keep into account.
02:53First, the incredible vulnerability of our neighbour.
02:59When 80,000 citizens cross the border without anything but a mobile phone as soon as the border is open,
03:10this shows a fragility.
03:11It shows that these people don't find an answer to their future, you know, lives and prospects in their country,
03:20and they want to look elsewhere.
03:22This is a vulnerability that is medium to long term to stay with us.
03:25We need to take care of that.
03:27Second one is...
03:28Ma'am, that's all we have time for.
03:30I'm very sorry, but thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with us.
03:35That was Arantxa González-Laya, a former Spanish foreign minister.
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