Archive

As King Mohammed VI said during his speech commemorating the 23rd anniversary of his ascension to the throne, Morocco and Algeria are indeed “two brotherly peoples, who are bound by...a common destiny,” just maybe not the one he is envisioning.

I’ve been working on Algeria for a long time. And I have never been busier. The unprecedented pace is consequence of the unanticipated conflagration of two factors. On the one hand, Algeria is finally stable and secure. On the other hand, the Russia/Ukraine conflict has made Algeria more important to Europe and the US than it has been at any moment in the past.

Following the announcement that Spain would reverse the flow of the now dormant Maghreb-España Pipeline (GME) and ship natural gas to Morocco, Algeria declared that if any of the volumes shipped to Morocco were of Algerian origin, it would suspend both piped gas and LNG shipments to Spain. The likelihood of Algeria closing the valves should not be underestimated and there is a very real chance Algeria suspends its Spanish supply contracts...

Once the North African darling of the international community and the so-called lone success story of the Arab Spring, Tunisia is drifting toward authoritarianism and hurtling toward an economic cliff. Tunisia is facing two scenarios in the near term: either Saied steps down or he embarks on a much more repressive phase in the face of violent social unrest.