UAE Earmark $300 Million to Support the Moroccan Energy Sector

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Friday granted 300 million US dollars to morocco to mitigate the spiralling oil prices, official sources told APA in Rabat.

The assistance was announced following an audience between King Mohammed VI of Morocco with the Emirate Energy minister, Mohammed Bin Dhaen Al Hamili, an envoy of the head of state Cheikh Khalifa Zayed Al-Nahyan, sources from the Moroccan foreign ministry disclosed.

The Moroccan diplomacy sees in this assistance as a “testimony of permanent solid links and active solidarity between the two sister countries”.

This is the second assistance of the kind to Morocco after the 500 million dollars released on May 6th by Saudi Arabia to Morocco.

Morocco imports almost all its oil, which culminates to 6 million tons. The Moroccan authorities have decided not to reflect the oil price increase on consumers by refusing the principle of indexation.

The public fuel and staple support fund is expected to generate 37 billion dirham (5 billion US dollars) in 2008, half of which will be allocated to oil products.

According to the Moroccan Change Office, the country’s imports for the first quarter this year amounted to 8.14 billion dirham (over 1 billion dollars), representing 68.9% compared to the same period in 2007.

Source African Press Agency

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