Morocco to be first Arab nation in EU summit

(MADRID) - Morocco will this weekend become the first Arab country to hold summit-level talks with the European Union when it meets the 27-nation bloc in Spain, which holds the EU presidency, officials said.

The meeting starting Saturday in the southern city of Granada will be a chance for the EU to grill Morocco on its human rights record and lack of development, including high rates of illiteracy, a European diplomat said.

Independence activists for the Western Sahara region, annexed by Morocco in 1975, plan to demonstrate on the sidelines of the meeting.

Moroccan Prime Minister Abbas El Fassi will lead his delegation into the talks with migration, the Middle East peace process and the global economic downturn among topics on the table.

Also in the team from Morocco -- which signed an association agreement with the EU in 1996 -- are ministers for agriculture, economy, education, trade and foreign affairs, the Spanish government said in a statement.

The landmark two-day meeting will be the first EU summit presided over by the bloc's first president, former Belgian prime minister Herman Van Rompuy, who assumed the post on December 1.

Van Rompuy will be joined by Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso.

Saturday's meeting is due to highlight exchanges between EU and Moroccan entrepreneurs on cooperation in transport, infrastructure and energy, according to a schedule released by the Spanish government.

On Sunday economic and democratic reforms in Morocco will dominate the agenda.

The European Union did not "intend to give lessons", a European diplomatic source said in Brussels.

"But at the European level, we say that while economic development in Morocco is good, many problems subsist, especially illiteracy," he said on condition of anonymity.

"There is a lack of development in certain parts of the country, which is worrying as it carries risks.

"The question of human rights will be addressed. It is unthinkable that the EU forget to raise that," the official said.

Western Sahara independence activists plan to stage their own meeting on the sidelines of the Granada summit, as well as a demonstration, with high-profile activist Aminatou Haidar in attendance.

Haidar staged a 32-day hunger strike last year at an airport on Spain's Canary Islands after Moroccan authorities denied her entry to her native Western Sahara as she returned from accepting a human rights award in the United States.

Her protest stoked tensions between Madrid and Rabat, which has pledged to grant Western Sahara widespread autonomy but rules out independence.

Morocco's annexation of Western Sahara in 1975 sparked a war between its forces and Algerian-backed Polisario guerrillas.

The two sides agreed to a ceasefire in 1991 but the UN-sponsored talks on Western Sahara's future have since made no headway.