Spain reacts to Moroccan embassy’s ‘controversial’ new map

OVIEDO, Spain

Spanish politicians continue reacting to a newly published map on the Moroccan Embassy’s website in Spain, which shows the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla as parts of Morocco.

According to the controversial map, the entire disputed territory of Western Sahara also belongs to Rabat.

On Tuesday, Spain’s Foreign Affairs Ministry emphasized that Ceuta and Melilla are Spanish, but did not confirm that it would take other actions against the Moroccan Embassy or Rabat.

The statement comes after the president of Spain’s Melilla, Juan Jose Imbroda, slammed the map as “another hostile aggression” by Morocco against the territory he represents. On Friday, he also demanded that Spain’s national government issue a “formal protest” to Rabat over the map.

By Sunday, Imbroda called Spain’s national government “whitewashers” willing to “swallow anything” from Morocco, as they hadn’t responded to his request.

On Monday, the Socialist Party leader in Melilla, Gloria Rojas, also joined the criticism.

“It’s intolerable that anyone, either inside or outside of our borders, would question our being Spanish and we will not tolerate it,” she said in a statement, adding that Spain’s national government “makes it very clear that Melilla and Ceuta are Spain. End of story.”

Spain has had a fragile relationship with Morocco in recent years.

The tension reached a boiling point in the spring of 2021, when Spain was caught treating the leader of the Polisario Front, which advocates for Western Saharan independence, for COVID behind Morocco’s back.

Around a month later, Moroccan border guards stood passively by as around 8,000 migrants swam into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta. Members of the Spanish government accused Morocco of weaponizing migrants.

But then, around a year later, Madrid made a surprising announcement — that it backed Morocco’s plan for Western Sahara in an apparent attempt to mend ties between the two nations.

Earlier this year, the two nations even held their first high-level bilateral summit in eight years, signing 20 agreements and, as Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said, promising not to “offend the other party, especially when it comes to our respective spheres of sovereignty.”

However, the truce did not last long. In May 2023, Madrid complained to Rabat for calling Ceuta and Melilla “Moroccan cities” in a document sent to the EU.