UK Tries To Soften Gibraltar's Attitude To Spain

Panorama on-line daily, Gibraltar

17 August 2001

This story is reproduced by kind permission of Panorama at: http://www.panorama.gi

Gibraltar's known resistance to making concessions to Spain could result in the UK Foreign Office sending a top team to Gibraltar to try and break down the Gibraltarian position.

Political sources in Gibraltar say that most people see any such concessions as favouring Anglo-Spanish relations at the expense of Gibraltar.

The Foreign Office is eager to strike a deal with Spain over the Single European Sky initiative, which Spain is blocking on the grounds that Gibraltar must be excluded unless it accepts a deal along the lines of the 1987 airport agreement, which all political parties here oppose.

In an effort to try and demolish the Gibraltar position, the Foreign Office have been urging Spain to offer an olive branch to Gibraltar - which explains why the Spanish foreign minister recently announced that he was ready to provide Gibraltar with much-needed telephone lines.

Such an offer has been effectively rejected by the Gibraltar government, as it does not address the central dispute affecting telephones - Spain's refusal to recognise the Gibraltar 350 code.

Since people here have learnt their lesson more than once, a top-flight visit by even the foreign secretary Jack Straw could well backfire, say political sources.

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