With little in the way of losses, Madrid and Rabat have been able to contain tension that could have caused a deterioration in bilateral relations. It is likely that Spanish King Juan Carlos' intervention in the crisis had a profound impact on preventing an escalation of disputes, which began this time with the treatment by Spanish border police of Moroccan visitors in the occupied city of Melilla. The crisis would likely have ended with political and regional repercussions whose future would be difficult to predict, if things spun out of control. Juan Carlos has always played a symbolic role of “cooling things down” in arranging the relationship with his country's southern neighbor. While the procedures for his assuming the Spanish throne during the final part of the life of General Franco involved waiting for a transitional opportunity, he did not want to confront the late King Hassan II of Morocco, who massed 350,000 volunteers for a green march, waiting for the signal to march into the desert. Instead, he chose to head to the Las Palmas islands and meet with the army leadership, urging them to respect a political decision to avoid a military confrontation with Rabat. However, Juan Carlos himself has found his hands practically tied on more than one occasion of stormy moments in Moroccan-Spanish relations. In 2003, he could not control the Spanish Prime Minister, Jose Maria Aznar, who sent Spanish troops to occupy the uninhabited island of Leila on the southern coast of the Mediterranean. This prompted the intervention of the White House, to mediate a return to the status quo. In fact, because of popular political pressure, Juan Carlos found himself obliged to visit the two occupied cities of Ceuta and Melilla, in a precedent that angered Rabat. Now, the Spanish monarch appears to be trying to have it both ways. He has called on Morocco's King Mohammad VI to an informal summit to discuss ways of containing the emerging crisis. At the same time, he has been committed, like the king of Morocco, to not harming the privileged relations between the two countries because of incidents that can be contained. However, it is interesting that these incidents, described by the Moroccan Foreign Ministry as racist, did not take place in Spanish territory over which Madrid's sovereignty is recognized, to become part of the core of the events affecting Moroccan émigrés who reside in Spain. However, the nature of this issue differs because it took place at border crossings leading to occupied Melilla, after Moroccan young men were hoisting their country's flag. This requires linking the treatment of this issue to a discussion of the optimal solutions. As for the acknowledgment of a special situation in dealing with foreign nationals who are visiting or passing through, the two cities are considered a free zone for shopping and bringing consumer goods into Moroccan markets. Against the backdrop of the recent racist events, which continued after the visit by the Spanish People's Party leader Mariano Rajoy to the two cities, it is interesting that the local authorities were going to put forward a plan to abolish visas for Moroccan nationals, as part of the search for an economic and commercial outlet to contain some of the repercussions of the economic and financial crisis that is affecting Spain. It seems like a good opportunity for going back to the Moroccan proposal to Madrid, to end the occupation of the two cities in return for a guarantee of Spain's economic and commercial interests in them. Without retaining a Moroccan market open to imports filling the two cities, the region cannot provide the conditions for survival. Moreover, the demographic make-up of the cities means they have majorities of Moroccan-origin residents, while the original Spanish population is an elderly one. Up to a short time ago, the wager was on linking between Spain's imposing of its authority on Gibraltar, whose sovereignty it disputes with Britain, and allowing for the beginning of a Moroccan-Spanish dialogue over the future of the two cities, and the islands falling under their influence. However, this approach has left deciding the fate of Gibraltar in the hands of the Europeans, and thus the “good neighbors” approach must fulfill the conditions of coexistence, and discover rational, realistic and feasible solutions to confront the problems, which at times are out of control, that have imposed themselves on the two countries.
