In accordance with the Royal Vision, Morocco has established itself as a key player in terms of migration governance in the Mediterranean, said, on Sunday in Rome, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, African Cooperation and Moroccans Living Abroad, Nasser Bourita.
“Under the leadership of HM King Mohammed VI, Morocco has accumulated proven experience in the governance of migratory flows over more than two decades,” said the minister, at the end of his participation, under the King’s High Instruction, in the International Conference on Development and Migration, chaired by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
The Royal Vision is reflected not only in the National Policy on Migration and Asylum, but also in the African Agenda on Migration that the King presented in His capacity as Leader of the AU on the issue of Migration, said the Minister, noting that this Agenda considers migration as a factor of rapprochement between populations and civilizations and tends to make migration a lever for co-development, a pillar of South-South cooperation and a vector of solidarity.
According to Bourita, “Morocco does not treat the migration issue as a theoretical issue, but as a lived reality”. “The Kingdom has provided concrete responses at the national, interregional, continental and multilateral levels despite several challenges,” he observed.
At the national level, Morocco has developed good practices in the integration of migrants, in particular the two regularization operations, the establishment of responsible and human border management and the health protection of migrants during the COVID19 pandemic, he said, adding that at the continental level, the Kingdom hosted the African Observatory on Migration, established in 2021.
At the interregional level, Morocco was the forerunner in 2006 of the Euro-African Dialogue on Migration and Development, known as the Rabat Process, which it currently chairs, and the initiator of the first practical roadmap for the implementation of the Marrakech Pact, which was initiated within the framework of the 5+5 Mediterranean Dialogue, the minister continued.
At the multilateral level, Morocco is the moral depositary of the Global Compact on safe, orderly and regular migration, known as the Marrakech Pact, since it hosted the Conference of its adoption and was recognized among the first Champions of its implementation, he noted.
In accordance with the High Royal Instructions, Morocco will contribute to the Rome Process, assured the minister, indicating that he has maintained constant exchanges with the Italian chairmanship of the meeting so that the conclusions of the meeting can reflect the positions he defends.
This is the African Agenda for Migration, presented by the Sovereign and adopted by African Heads of State in January 2018, the balance between the different dimensions of migration, regular and irregular, by enshrining the positive narrative on migration and the importance of channels for legal migration and the consecration of African priorities in this area, particularly for increased solidarity with the continent, explained Bourita.
He added that the Kingdom also supports the consecration of shared responsibility for effective management of migration and the non-singularization of transit countries, the integration of the Euro-African Migration and Development Dialogue that Morocco initiated in 2006, a clearer reference to the standards of international law, in particular human and humanitarian rights, and the removal of intrusive concepts such as “hot spots”.
The conclusions also included recognition of the UN Pact on Migration, adopted in Marrakech in 2018, as well as its review process to which Morocco has made an active and substantial contribution, he said.
This event, organized at the initiative of the Italian government, under the theme “commitments and shared solutions for the Mediterranean and Africa”, brought together leaders of the States of the southern shore of the wider Mediterranean, the Middle East and the Gulf, as well as the Member States of the European Union of first arrivals and a number of countries of the Sahel and the Horn of Africa, as well as the heads of European institutions and international financial institutions.
According to the Italian Council of Ministers, this conference aims in particular to launch an international roadmap for the implementation of concrete measures for growth and development throughout the Mediterranean and Africa, to tackle the root causes of irregular migratory flows to defeat the criminal activities of human traffickers and to find solutions to protect the environment and meet the challenges of energy diversification and climate change.