The Indian Ocean Commission (IOC) summit in Madagascar was expected to revive this regional organisation. Set up in 1984, the IOC didn’t seem to have made much headway in the region. All heads of state present – especially French president Jacques Chirac and Mauritian prime minister, Navin Ramgoolam – reiterated their will to support the reorientation of the IOC. The PM is sure that “this will not be a conference where there are only discussions and no action afterwards.”

For his first trip as Mauritian PM, Navin Ramgoolam chaired a forum on economic and commercial cooperation. The other forums concerned political, diplomatic and security cooperation, sustainable development and solidarity as well as the reinforcement of regional cultural identity.

One of the most important decisions of the summit was the eventual abolition of visas between IOC countries. This aims at facilitating the movement of people within the region. Member states will however have to discuss the methods they intend to use to open their borders.

Terrorism was at the core of the debate after the recent blasts in London and Egypt. Navin Ramgoolam said that the IOC now has a platform of information for security matters to fight terrorism and drug trafficking. The IOC chairman, Marc Ravalomanana, thinks that this summit has given the commission a real boost. The French President qualified the IOC as a “model of cooperation” and highlighted the fact that the region is faced with similar challenges to be addressed together.

The Mauritian officials seized the opportunity to expose their vision of the sugar protocol to the European Union. The PM had lunch with the French President where he expressed his fears and requests on the sugar issue. “The European commissioner, Louis Michel, was present and Chirac championed Mauritius (...) He gave me assurance that he would defend Mauritian interests,” Navin Ramgoolam declared after his meeting with Jacques Chirac.

The minister of Foreign Affairs, Madan Dulloo, said that the African Caribbean Pacific (ACP) countries have been given the opportunity to expose the dangers of the reform if the European commission insists in the same way. Back from Dakar where he had defended the access of Mauritian textiles to the US market, the minister stopped in Madagascar for that.

The IOC has expressed its solidarity over the issue, as the whole region would suffer from the consequences of the drop in sugar prices. Although he didn’t want to sound too optimistic, the minister of Foreign affairs nevertheless implied that he was satisfied with the EU support. He is happy that the EU took the time to listen to their requests and now he can only “wait and see…”