The European Union is reportedly planning to finalize a migration pact with Morocco by the end of 2024, Austria's largest newspaper Kronen Zeitung reported on Monday. Quoting high-ranking diplomats from Brussels, the newspaper indicates that Rabat and Brussels have been negotiating said deal for the last seven years. Indeed, Morocco and the EU agreed on a migration pact in December 2023. This agreement is expected to be finalized by the end of this year. The same source explains that the deal with Morocco has become a must to curb arrivals after a deal signed in 2016 with Turkey had shifted migration routes westward. Despite the absence of a deal, the EU has been granting Morocco financial support to curb migrants arrivals. According to data on EU migration support in Morocco, published in February 2023, the European body has allocated more than €2.1 billion between 2014 and 2022 in migration support to Morocco. Around €1.5 billion of them were destined to overall bilateral cooperation with Morocco between 2014 and 2020, including under the EU Emergency Trust Fund for Africa (EUTF). The EU also allocated €631 million to the North African Kingdom between 2021 and 2022 under the Neighborhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument (NDICI – Global Europe).
