Telegraph | King of Morocco to be biggest benefactor of EU trade agreement

The European Parliament’s committee for International Trade last week gave the green light to a new agriculture agreement that will ease restrictions on the importation of fruit and vegetables from Morocco.

But it has emerged that the single biggest beneficiary of the deal will be the King of Morocco, who is head of one of the three largest agricultural producers in the north African country and lays claim to 12,000 hectares of the nation’s most fertile farmland.

Human rights groups have warned that royal estates covered with polytunnels stretch across swathes of the Dahkla region of the Western Sahara, the former Spanish colony annexed by Morocco in 1975.

They argue that the deal amounts to a breach of international law and effectively legitimises Morocco’s occupation of the disputed Western Sahara region.

The Western Sahara’s Polisario Front independence movement is preparing to lobby the EU Parliament not to ratify the deal when it is put to the vote next month.

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(Source: sharquaouia)