At a time when the governments of Spain and Morocco are negotiating the border between the two countries, Morocco has announced that it will conduct a survey of around 1 billion barrels of oil less than 200 kilometres from the Canary Islands.

The finding was made by the British company Europa Oil & Gas, which has announced that it will have 75% of the survey and exploitation rights; the remaining 25% will be for the Moroccan public company Office National des Hydrocarbures et des Mines. According to expert estimates, this oil and gas exploitation project could involve a business of around EUR 100 billion, similar to Morocco’s Gross Domestic Product.

Protests against the survey

More than seven years ago, Repsol announced that it was going to conduct oil surveys near the coast of the Canary Islands, and thousands of Canarian citizens protested against these prospects, which have not yet been withdrawn. In fact, if there were any accidents in these surveys and surveys, the coasts of Africa and the Canary Islands would be seriously affected.

Special diplomatic moment

This business, of almost EUR 100 billion, is taking place at a very special diplomatic moment between Morocco and Spain, as in March the government presiding over Pedro Sánchez completely changed the historical position of the Spanish State on Western Sahara. The Spanish State has remained neutral in recent decades, but in March 2022 Pedro Sánchez accepted the Plan for the Autonomy of the Sahara presented by Morocco 2007.urtean at the UN.

After a radical change in the position on the Western Sahara, Madrid and Rabat are negotiating a new configuration of the water limits, and the news of the new surveys comes in this special context.