Trade Agreements
Dail Éireann — 2026-02-05
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Sinéad Gibney (SD), Dublin Rathdown

I thank the Minister of State. It is comforting to hear that there is activity on the part of the Government on this. The Court of Justice of the European Union ruled that the consent of the Sahrawi people had to be sought or that there had to be a tangible benefit for them. Instead of seeking their consent, the EU committed to provide tangible benefit to them and to a regular control mechanism to evaluate the benefit required for implicit consent. Can the Minister of State provide clarity on that control mechanism in the deal? What is Ireland doing? The Minister of State stated that we are seeking updates and so on, but I ask him to seek that clarity and ensure it is robust enough to uphold the rights of the Sahrawi people or guarantee them that tangible benefit in line with the ruling. It is incredible to me that we have a trade deal that has been in provisional application since October, yet there is no clarity on how it is better than the previous version of the deal, which the courts ruled against. I welcome Ireland registering those concerns. Morocco enjoys preferential tariffs while the Sahrawi people in Western Sahara continue to be dispossessed of their land and occupied.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-02-05/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:36+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-02-05