This Policy Paper seeks to analyse ways to strengthen Euro-Mediterranean relations in a rapidly changing landscape marred by the fossil energy crisis resulting from the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the complexities of the energy transition in the Mediterranean and the severe impact of climate change in the region. The paper begins by presenting the main reasons that led to the exhaustion of the Euro-Mediterranean energy and climate space from the Barcelona Declaration of 1995 until the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This section further explains why the EU’s Mediterranean strategy based on mega-projects to export energy from MPCs to the EU, backed by weak regional institutions, failed to create an effective space of integration and policy convergence.
