French ambassador in Morocco: Holland’s last visit to Algeria wasn’t at the expense of Morocco

By Mohamed Hikal

Moroco News Tribune

Taroudant, Morocco—Charles Fries, France’s ambassador in Morocco, uncovered the reasons behind Holland’s last visit to Algeria had no ulterior or evil motives.

France didn’t mean to get close to Algeria at the expense of its relations with Morocco. Due to France’s extended colonial rule in Algeria and the ramifications of the era, France decided to smooth things over and improve the « complicated » relations, said the ambassador, Alakhbar newspaper reported.

In a press conference held Thursday at the Higher Institution for Management Studies in Casablanca, Mr. Fries expressed France’s belief in a future stronger Maghreb both economically and politically. “Our objective is to keep our relations with all Maghreb countries sound”, he said.

Regarding Moroccan-French relations after the Social Party and the PJD (Justice and Development Party) took over the government in France and Morocco respectively, the ambassador confirmed that any alterations in the nature of governments won’t affect the bilateral relations as long as both governments reflect the people’s choice.

On this occasion, Mr. Fries pointed to some achievements such as France’s Renault manufacturing in the Moroccan northern city of Tangier. However, he also seized the opportunity to pinpoint France’s retreating investments in Morocco as they had been shrinking from 25 percent in the nineties to 14 percent at the present time, which was attributed to the fierce competition by other countries, namely Turkey, China and some Gulf countries.

In the same respect, Mr. Fries added that France is Morocco’s first political partner, a partnership embodied in France’s support to Morocco mostly in matters of territorial integrity, relation with the E.U., security, illegal immigration, terrorism and drug smuggling.

Concerning France’s military intervention in Mali, the ambassador stated that this intervention had no imperial or economic motives. He added that this action was a spontaneous response to the Malian president in order to spare the country an unnecessary extermination.