Morocco's 1995 fisheries agreement with the European union: A crisis resolved

During 1995, tensions between Morocco and the European Union ‐ and Spain in particular ‐ reached an alarming level. The immediate source of these tensions was the lapsing, one year early, of the existing fisheries agreement between Morocco and the EU and the inability and unwillingness of the two parties to negotiate a new agreement. The absence of a new agreement in the months following April 1995 deprived Spain's large fishing fleet of access to the rich fishing grounds within Morocco's 200‐mile exclusive economic zone. During the same period of tensions, Morocco was eager, in response to initiatives from the European Commission, to negotiate a new and more advantageous association agreement and in particular to improve the terms of access for Moroccan agricultural products into the EU. The way in which the two issues ‐ fisheries and the association agreement ‐ became linked, to the ultimate advantage of the EU, is a classic example of the use of power in international diplomacy. In this case the economic power of the EU was reinforced by the political solidarity among the EU's 15 member states in dealing with a single state of the Mediterranean ‘12’. In the end Morocco felt compelled to make significant concessions on the fisheries issue and agreement was reached on a new accord with the EU in November.