Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-10-28-Speech-4-147"
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"en.19991028.4.4-147"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, within the global framework of relations between the European Union and Morocco, I would like to highlight, on the occasion of this oral question on the fisheries agreement which we are dealing with today, the regional dimension of that agreement. I refer to a Community region, European politically speaking but African geographically speaking, which is called the Canary Islands and is situated on the Atlantic flank opposite Morocco.
In recent years, including Spain’s time as a democracy, we have experienced various situations where fishing has always been an unresolved issue between the parties because of the contentious issue of defining our territorial waters in relation to the neighbouring continent of Africa.
Nevertheless, we have recently managed to take cooperative positions, by means of the Morocco-European Union agreements, despite having other unresolved matters, such as agriculture (tomatoes), the environment (nuclear energy policy) and the Saharan referendum, which affects us significantly from a global point of view.
In fact, the Committee on Agriculture and Fisheries of the Spanish Senate has begun a visit to the Canary Islands in order to directly familiarise themselves with the problems facing the primary sector: agriculture and fishing.
The President of the Government of the Canary Islands has also expressed his desire to visit Morocco in order to hold a dialogue and often a direct channel of communication with the Moroccan Government, along the lines of the good neighbourliness which should characterise the relations between two neighbouring and civilised peoples, since frequently the viscosity of reality – as Mr Obiols said so well the other day during the debate in Brussels in relation to the common destiny of Europe and Morocco – does not always permit the most appropriate type of action.
We trust that peace and stability will reign in our Atlantic area and we have a good opportunity to use the fisheries agreement or other European instruments for transnational cooperation to achieve this.
I hope that Morocco will fulfil its international obligations, as indicated in the talks held last week in Brussels by the Moroccan authorities. In any event, I hope that the diplomacy of the European Commission will adequately defend the general interests of the Community fishermen who are affected by this future fisheries agreement between the European Union and Morocco.
Lastly, I would like to remind you of a Spanish saying – which I believe is relevant today – which says: “he who wants to eat fish, Commissioner, must get his breeches wet”. For this reason there are many of us here, Mr Fischler, who want to convince you of the social and economic importance of renewing the European Union-Morocco fisheries agreement."@en1
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