ECJ Rulings Against Morocco Require Immediate Action

The head of the Italian Parliamentary Intergroup for Friendship with the Sahrawi People, Stefano Vaccari, called on European governments to take immediate diplomatic action following the historic ruling by the European Court of Justice invalidating trade agreements between the European Union and Morocco relating to the resources exploited in the occupied Sahrawi territories.

The Sahara Press Service quoted Vaccari as saying that “the European Court’s ruling finally recognizes the ownership and right to self-determination of the Sahrawi people who they were forcibly expelled from their lands by the Moroccan army since 1976.”

According to Vaccari, this ruling underscores “the clear boundary between legality and abuse” concerning Morocco’s occupation of the territory.

The Italian MP urged his country’s Foreign Minister, Antonio Tajani, to engage all the necessary diplomatic initiatives through international bodies to facilitate the Sahrawi people’s return to their homeland, which remains illegally occupied.

“Enough with looking the other way,” Vaccari declared, reaffirming that the intergroup will continue to support the Polisario Front’s struggle for independence and liberation of Western Sahara on all fronts.

He also called on the Italian Parliament to discuss the motion on Western Sahara, which was introduced over 18 months ago but remains pending.

The statements of the head of the Italian Parliamentary Intergroup for Friendship with the Sahrawi People come amid growing international recognition of the suffering of the Sahrawi people under the illegal Moroccan occupation and the affirmation of their rights to freedom and independence under international law.

The European Court of Justice confirmed in two historic rulings issued by its upper chamber the illegality of the EU-Morocco agreements concluded in violation of the Sahrawi people’s right to consent and permanent sovereignty over their natural resources, and also definitively rejected the appeals of the European Council and Commission.

The European Court of Justice ruled that “the 2019 EU-Morocco trade agreements on fisheries and agricultural products, to which the people of Western Sahara did not consent, were concluded in breach of the principles of the right to self-determination and the relative effect to treaties.”

The court recognized all the gains made in 2016 and 2018 as an inviolable basis, stressing that Western Sahara enjoys a separate and independent status from Moroccan territory and that the Sahrawi people constitute a third party in relations between the European Union and Morocco and must be approved.

The ECJ recognized all the gains made in 2016 and 2018 as an inviolable basis, stressing that Western Sahara enjoys a separate and independent status from Moroccan territory and that the Sahrawi people constitute a third party in relations between the European Union and Morocco and must be approved.