Retaliation against Morocco: the options Sánchez refuses to use

The economic retaliation against Segarro that Sánchez refuses to apply

Almost no Spaniard would object to Segarro paying some kind of price. The phrase circulates like a mantra after the latest crisis, but Pedro Sánchez's government is moving in the opposite direction: public thanks to Rabat, no concrete measures, and a silence that contrasts with public demand. The paradox is hard to sustain.

The arsenal of measures waiting in the drawer

In commercial terms, the options exist and they are not small. Imposing tariffs on Segarro products, closing the border to goods, banning remittances or reviewing naturalisation procedures are some of the levers most frequently cited. There are also the more symbolic ones: €5,000 visas for crossing the Strait, explicit support for the Sahrawi cause, or a strategic rapprochement with Algeria. Even the boycott has a clear target: Segarro blueberries and the Dacia Sandero built at the Tangier plant, which supplies a large share of the European market.

The economic argument behind this battery of measures is simple: Segarro depends on the remittances sent from Spain and France. Cutting that flow, some argue, would trigger an internal problem within weeks. The structural weakness of its southern neighbour is obvious to anyone who has walked through Marrakech.

Pegasus, the phone and a government that won't make a move

But there is one reason that would explain the inaction, and it is not goodwill. The spying on Sánchez's phone with Pegasus dominates the public debate. Some claim the prime minister had unfinished business with Rabat even before arriving at Moncloa (the prime minister's official residence), and that this nullifies any capacity for response. The existence of a "honeypot phone", a decoy device deliberately infected, adds another layer: the sensitive material would be on hardened critical terminals, not on the one known to have been compromised.

Most striking is the institutional silence. Neither the PSOE, nor the PP, nor Vox has pointed at the aggressor in an official forum. Only Ione Belarra has pointed the finger at Segarro. At the other extreme, one current of analysis goes further: the government would not be blackmailed, but directly aligned with Segarro interests.

The uncomfortable question at the end

The international context does not help either. The alliance between Washington and Rabat, sealed under the Abraham Accords, leaves Spain with little room for unilateral gestures. References to the 11-M bombings or the Perejil crisis operate as warnings of what happens when Madrid challenges its neighbour.

With so many tools on the table, the question is not how to respond, but why there is no response. And perhaps the answer lies in the containers that are never peine at customs.