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| First state visit: Algeria's President Abdelaziz Bouteflika (l.) welcomed French President Nicolas Sarkozy to his palace on
Tuesday. Zohra Bensemra/Reuters |
In Algeria, Sarkozy condemns colonialism, pushes Mediterranean Union
The French president called the colonial system 'unjust' and pitched a regional community for Mediterranean states.
from the December 5, 2007 edition
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North Africa's last foray into grand pacts with Europe, the Barcelona process of 1995, was meant to create deeper ties and security between northern and southern Mediterranean countries through stronger trade and economic relations.
At the time, the process generated "a lot of optimism" but ultimately didn't result in many tangible benefits for North African countries, says Robert Parks, resident director of the American Institute for Maghreb Studies in Oran, Algeria.
Algeria will be one of the toughest negotiators in a union like what Sarkozy envisions because of its abundant natural gas that is needed in Europe. Neighbors like Tunisia and Morocco share a French colonial history but as protectorates. Being much poorer countries, they appear to welcome the idea of greater ties to the wealthy neighbors to the north.
"Algeria doesn't want to be dependent. The 132 years of colonialism has really ingrained this in people here," says Mr. Parks. That desire, he says, makes Algeria leery of agreements like the one proposed by Sarkozy.
Countries like Morocco, Tunisia, and Egypt, which are resource-starved and need trade ties to survive, are likely to be responsive to diplomatic overtures such as the union idea, analysts say.
"Tunisia is going to be in favor of any sort of cooperation. It's always at the cutting edge of international discourse," says Parks.
But aligning the interests of countries as diverse as those that ring the Mediterranean Sea into a single arrangement will be a significant hurdle. "For [the union] to extend from Morocco all the way to Turkey is hard to manage," says Layachi.
For the Arab countries, except Egypt and possibly Morocco, dealing with Israel will be off the table. Turkey frets the union is an end-run around its European Union aspirations.
France also appears to be interested in maintaining its heavy cultural and linguistic presence in Francophone countries, while those countries squirm with the uncomfortable mix of colonial and nationalist influences.
Those concerns, for now, are based on only suspicions. "Average people don't have a lot of interest in it also, because they don't know what a Mediterranean Union will look like," says Parks. "People don't even know enough about it to have a useful debate."
Material from the Associated Press contributed to this story.
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