Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2011-12-14-Speech-3-243-000"
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"en.20111214.22.3-243-000"2
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"The European Parliament has rejected the Fisheries Partnership Agreement between the European Union and Morocco. A technical agreement has been rejected on the basis of specious arguments, yet, above all, this sends a disastrous political signal. Let us start with fishing: apparently, this protocol offers ‘a very low cost-benefit ratio’.
So Morocco should be compared to our partners in Switzerland, Norway and the United States, should it? Nonsense! Ranked 103rd in terms of GDP per capita, Morocco cannot compete with the world’s heavyweights. We should also accept that this protocol constitutes a form of economic development assistance.
Yet this is not the heart of the matter: we are sending a regrettable political message, and doing so on the very day that the European Parliament is awarding the Sakharov Prize to the leaders of the Arab Spring. It is a signal that we distrust Morocco, one of the most stable countries in the region, the only one to have begun the process of democratisation, albeit imperfect and arguably inadequate, yet with no bloodshed. A country where the king has understood what his people want and has rapidly put forward proposals for substantial reforms.
What is worse, this vote constitutes a victory for Morocco’s critics, in particular, its neighbour, Algeria. It is not just fishing that is at stake here: it is democracy."@en1
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