Morocco and its New Foreign Policy in Africa. Continuities, Discontinuities and Future Prospects

In recent years, Morocco has made a certain shift in its external agenda towards Africa. From the greater discretion that characterised the position of the Alaouite regime in the previous three decades, the country has undertaken a series of decisions that indicate that something very fundamental could be changing in Moroccan international policy towards this region. Undoubtedly, the return to the African Union (AU) in February 2017, or the formal demand for accession to the CEDEAO/ECOWAS (an organisation that brings together the states of the West African region), a few months later, are two far-reaching decisions that indicate that Africa could become one of the cornerstones of the new Moroccan diplomacy. This article has three main objectives. Firstly, to analyse from a historical perspective the relations of the Moroccan regime with the African countries, especially with Sub-Saharan region. Second, to understand the root causes that have motivated this new diplomatic strategy. We will contextualize the international agenda of the government of Mohamed VI and focus especially on the implications that this strategy has for the issue of Western Sahara, or with regard to the present and future of the AU. Finally, the article will attempt to address some of the possible implications that this may have for the main challenges facing the Sub-Saharan region