Parsley Island: an Over-Seasoned Dispute

Parsley Island and the intervention of the United States Abstract On 11 July 2002 a dozen Moroccan armed police occupied Parsley Island, a rocky outcrop off the north Moroccan coast. Five days later Spanish armed forces intervened to „liberate‟ the island and repatriated the Moroccans. On 20 July, following the intervention of the US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, the State Department drew up an agreement acceptable to both sides and Spain withdrew. This article examines why Morocco occupied the island, why Spain used force in reply and why the US became involved. As with many territorial disputes, the occupation and the responses to it were symptomatic of more deep-seated grievances between the disputants, while the involvement of the Bush Administration was inspired by its own self-interest in the aftermath of 9/11. Around midday on Thursday 11 July 2002 some fishermen from the Spanish North African enclave of Ceuta reported to the Civil Guard headquarters there that about a dozen Moroccan armed police had occupied Parsley Island (“la Isla Perejil” in Spanish but known in Morocco as “Laila” or “Taura” in the Rif dialect), a rocky outcrop about 200 metres off the north Moroccan coast.1 The Moroccans were backed up by a small company of the Royal Armed Forces, which was stationed in an abandoned artillery battery at Punta Leona on the mainland. Later that day an announcement was issued from Rabat claiming that the island was Moroccan and that they had no intention of leaving.2 The Spanish Foreign Minister, Ana Palacio, who had only been appointed two days earlier, made immediate contact with her Moroccan counterpart, Mohamed Benaissa. A verbal note was sent via the Spanish Embassy in Rabat to point out that such an action on Morocco‟s part was incompatible with the Treaty of Friendship, Good Neighbourliness and Cooperation that the two Governments had signed in 1991 and to call on the Moroccan Government to withdraw. The observation by Spanish forces on the following day (12 July) of further Moroccan naval movements around the Isla del Rey, one of the Chafarinas islands situated 27 kilometres off the coast of Melilla (another Spanish enclave further to the 1 east), led to a build up of Spanish troops in the area.3 Five days later Spanish armed forces intervened to „liberate‟ the island. This article tries to establish what exactly took place in this bizarre episode, why Morocco suddenly decided to occupy the island, why Spain opted to use force to remove the Moroccans, and in particular why the United States became involved in the dispute over such a tiny territory. It becomes clear that, as with many territorial disputes, the occupation and the responses to it were symptomatic of other, more deep-seated and far-reaching grievances between the disputants, while the involvement of the world‟s super-power was as much to do with its own self-interest as it was to act as a broker for peace. Spain, Morocco and the US Before embarking on an examination of the details of the dispute over the island, it is important to consider the place of Spain and Morocco in United States foreign policy and the overall strategic interests of the US in the geopolitically sensitive region of North Africa. In the immediate aftermath of World War Two Washington‟s relations with Madrid were problematic. During the War itself General Franco, who had come to power in 1939 after a three-year bloody civil war between Nationalists and Republicans, had been technically neutral but plainly supportive of the Axis powers and after 1945 he continued to head a fascist regime of the kind that the Allies had spent six years struggling to defeat. There was no question of Spain being included in the Marshall Aid plan, but with the descent of the Iron Curtain over Eastern Europe and the start of the Cold War, it became clear that it was in the best interests of the US to find a way of bringing Spain back within the Western European fold on account of its geostrategically significant location at the western end of the Mediterranean. Given Spain‟s economic isolation in post-war Europe Franco was quite ready to offer the US the opportunity to use Spanish air bases from 1953 in exchange for substantial economic aid. During the 1950s Spain rejoined the wider international community, becoming a member of the United Nations, the World Bank and the IMF, but it was not until after the death of Franco in 1975 and the subsequent establishment of Spain as a constitutional monarchy with an elected parliament that membership of other 2 international groupings, in particular the European Community and NATO, became options that were taken up in the 1980s. US-Spanish relations remained on an even keel until the bombing of Libya in 1986, when the centre-left government of Felipe González refused to allow American aircraft to enter Spanish airspace. As a consequence there remained a residue of concern about whether Spain could be seen as a reliable ally whenever the US might need its support. As an American international lawyer expressed it, writing in the Policy Review in 2002 when Britain was considering sharing the sovereignty of Gibraltar with Spain: „Spain, though in broad outline a friend, contains sufficient political complexities to raise questions about the wisdom of letting indispensable air and sea-lanes and the rock astride them go to Spanish jurisdiction. Spain did not lend a helping hand at an important juncture before, and the prevailing political culture there would counsel prudence about its future conduct‟.4 If this view was shared in Washington at the time, it was later assuaged by the significantly more pro-US views of the centre-right Partido Popular Prime Minister, José María Aznar, who had come to power in 1996 and later readily (and very publicly at a meeting in the Azores in May 2003) joined George W. Bush‟s „alliance of the willing‟ over Iraq.5 At the time of the Parsley Island crisis Spain was still very much seen as a close and important ally of the US in the „war on terror‟, not only because Al-Qaeda was reported to have had strong networks in Spain and because Spain had been used as a base for planning the 9/11 attacks,6 but also because Aznar had shown himself to be a hard-liner against Spain‟s domestic terrorists from the Basque separatist movement ETA, and therefore someone who was held in regard by the US President. If Aznar‟s Spain was deemed worthy of American support, so too was the regime of King Mohammed VI of Morocco, the other party in the dispute over Parsley Island. Relations with Morocco were the oldest in America‟s history, with Morocco the first to recognise the United States of America in 1777 and holding the longest standing treaty with the US – the Treaty of Friendship dating from 1786. As the US Administration began its early forays into its new role as a world power at the beginning of the twentieth century, Morocco was one of the first to secure the direct 3 involvement of the President. Theodore Roosevelt insisted on participating at the 1906 Algeciras Conference which decided the fate of Morocco, on the grounds that „if the United States truly was a world power with interests everywhere around the globe, then America should be included in the conferences which drew up the boundaries,‟7 even though it could scarcely be said that at that juncture the United States had a direct interest in what happened in Morocco in particular and North Africa in general. Indeed during the rest of the century the State Department appeared uncertain as to how to focus and organise its relations with the countries of North Africa and Sub- Saharan Africa8 - perhaps a reflection of the fact that until the 1980s Africa was seen as „an area of peripheral concern for the American people and for most decision- makers concerned with the overall shape of American foreign policy.‟9 However, as the US increasingly found itself in the role of a regional power broker in the Middle East in the second half of the twentieth century, so it has taken a growing interest in the Mediterranean region in general and the countries of North Africa in particular. Morocco itself was one of those African countries that throughout the twentieth century received active support and preferential aid agreements in exchange for the offer of valued services relating to America‟s broader global concerns.10 Indeed Morocco has been America‟s most favoured of the Mahgreb countries of North Africa, encouraged in recent times by the fact that „only in Morocco has the popular spread of Islamism been contained by the strength of King Hassan‟s Islamic authority,‟11 but also by „the government‟s ability to open political space for the Islamic parties [which] has had a positive effect on curbing the rise of radical Islam.‟12 King Hassan II, the present King Mohammed‟s father who ruled Morocco for 38 years from 1961, listed himself as an „advisor of American presidents‟ and his country „has maintained a close relationship with Washington as a partner with integrity in Middle East matters and also south of the Sahara.‟13 Having been one of the first Arab and Islamic nations to denounce the 9/11 attacks in the US, Morocco was considered by the US at the time of the Parsley Island crisis to be an important ally – perhaps even more important that Spain – and a valued combatant in the „war on terror‟.14 It is clear from this brief summary of US relations with each of the disputants over Parsley Island that relationships were long-standing and in general positive.

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