End of UMA ministerial council: next session in october, no date for summit

The ministerial council of the Arab Maghreb Union (UMA) wound up this Tuesday its 8th session with a decision to meet again next October but has not announced any date for a possible summit of the five member states.

Algerian foreign minister, Abdelaziz Belkhadem, whose country holds the UMA rotating chairmanship, said at a press conference the venue of the upcoming ministerial session was not decided but his country is ready to host it.

Asked on the possibility of holding a summit between heads of state of Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia -forming the UMA- he said no date was set and explained that a summit meeting depends on the progress in the meetings of the specialized ministerial commissions, the follow-up committee and the ministerial council.

He went on economy and finance ministers of the UMA countries will meet prior to the ministerial council session to discuss the project of a Maghreban bank on Investments and external trade.

The Algiers session, the first in over five years, also decided that the follow-up committee will meet every three months.

Morocco was represented in the Algiers session by its secretary of state for foreign affairs and cooperation, Taieb Fassi Fihri.

The sub-regional grouping, set up in 1989, has been frozen since 1995, due to a Moroccan-Algerian dispute over Algiers' direct involvement in the Moroccan Sahara issue and its backing to the separatist Polisario group.