EUbusiness

Spain demands EU compensation in fishing row

15 December 2011, 16:41 CET

(BRUSSELS) - Spain said Thursday it will ask for compensation from the EU after the European Parliament cancelled a deal giving its trawlers special access to fish in Moroccan waters.

"I am going to ask for compensation for the damage to Spain's fishing fleet," said Spain's Farm, Environment and Fisheries Minister Rosa Aguilar, who was in Brussels for talks.

The lawmakers blocked the extension by 12 months of controversial special access for EU fishermen to Moroccan waters, until the interests of disputed Western Sahara are taken on board.

Opponents of the deal, which had mainly benefitted Spanish fishermen, have long argued that Morocco has no claim to waters off the disputed region and that aid to Morocco does not find its way to Western Saharans.

Morocco annexed Western Sahara in 1976 after a Spanish withdrawal, and Polisario fighters took up arms for an independent state.

The UN brokered a ceasefire in 1991 but a promised self-determination referendum has never been held.

The blockage of the deal, which provided for annual payments to Rabat, prompted the North African nation to immediately ban all European fishing boats.

"We will defend our fleet and the men now without work," said Aguilar.

She said all Spanish fishing boats had headed back to port to comply with the ban. "This is going to cause major harm to the Spanish fleet, which is mainly from Andalucia and the Canaries," she told reporters.

"We are talking about a fleet of about 70 boats and more than 500 direct jobs that will be affected."

The motion in parliament, passed by 326 votes to 296, was taken on the eve of talks between European Union fisheries ministers in Brussels, set to agree quotas for the Atlantic, North and Baltic Seas as well as the Mediterranean.

The EU's 27 states had agreed in July to extend an agreement allowing their boats to fish more off Morocco in exchange for funding, which campaigners say breaches international law regarding the people of Western Sahara.

Under the deal, Morocco would have received 36.1 million euros ($46 million) to let some 120 fishing boats, mainly from Spain, operate in its waters.

Finnish liberal MEP Carl Haglund said that payments already made were "a waste of taxpayers' funds" with no environmental benefit and no economic impact either to the EU or Morocco.

"Financial support for the development of local fisheries must be used properly and more efficiently while monitoring of where the money goes must be improved," the parliament said.

MEPs also "called on the Commission to ensure that a new protocol fully respects international law and benefits all affected local populations, including the Sahrawi people," a parliament statement said.

Spain's Aguilar said "I respect the decision but I'm not supporting it."

"I am going to ask for negotiations to be started up again," she added as she went into talks with counterparts.

Morocco's fisheries minister, Aziz Akhannouch, said in a statement on Thursday that the EU parliament's move had "very negative consequences for the relationship between the EU and Morocco".

But he added that "rather than a threat looming over the industry, this is an opportunity," according to news agency MAP.

"We have our own means of developing the sector. We have a lot of professionals who want to fish this resource and develop it to benefit Morocco."