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Great Expectations!
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The Spanish director-general for Europe, Jose Pons, is hopeful that the tripartite talks will establish a good climate that will allow for the sovereignty of Gibraltar to be tackled.
Sr Pons was speaking ahead of the talks in Mallorca.
It can be disclosed that Sr Pons held a meeting in Madrid with the Spanish foreign minister Miguel Angel Moratinos.
The start of the talks last night suffered a setback as all the delegations had not arrived on time apparently due to flight connections. A photocall was postponed to this morning.
The trilateral talks are not about sovereignty. When the time comes for sovereignty talks, it will be a bilateral issue between Britain and Spain, say the Spanish. It follows that Madrid considers that Gibraltar has no say in questions of sovereignty which is why sovereignty does not feature in the trilateral meetings.
However, while Spain claims the sovereignty of the Rock, she says that the sovereignty of the land on which the airport is built is Spanish sovereignty already. That is why it is so important that elements of controls are not given to the Spanish side in any airport deal, as that could be construed as boosting the Spanish notion that the isthmus is under Spanish sovereignty.
It is known that the Spanish have been angling for joint management of the air terminal, including Spanish police/customs presence. But this must have been resisted by the Gibraltar delegation.
As revealed in PANORAMA yesterday, Sr Pons is Mallorcan-born and the reason why this round of talks is taking place there is due to his own initiative, as it was London which should have hosted this third round of trilateral talks.
This is seen by Sr Pons as a "crucial and decisive" meeting to reach agreement over issues such as what he describes as "the joint use of the airport". Does this mean that the air terminal would be under 'joint use', meaning that Spain would have preferential treatment to any other users of the airport? Is it 'joint use' or simply 'use' of the airport? The situation will hopefully be cleared after the current talks.
The Spanish have been saying that the talks allow them to have a say on Gibraltart's development. What is not clear is if they will be getting what they wanted, given that there is great pressure from non-political sources in the Campo area for greater use of the Gibraltar airport,of practical developments, as businessmen and others would welcome flights being resumed to Madrid in particular, as this would be helpful to Campo business.
There are great expectations that something will emerge from the talks that will enable Jack Straw and Miguel Angel Moratinos to hold a full ministerial meeting before the year is out.
The Gibraltar government has been adopting a policy of secrecy. It was after we revealed yesterday even the hotel where the talks would be taking place, that the Government finally issued a Press release confirming this and saying they would be returning to Gibraltar this evening.
La Linea mayor threatens with anti-submarine protest
While talks are going on in Mallorca on cooperation between Spain and Gibraltar, the mayor of La Linea Juan Carlos Juarez has threatened with organising a major demonstration if the event of any further calls at Gibraltar by nuclear-powered submarines.
He celebrated the departure of HMS Trenchant and added that patience was now thin at the constant arrival of what he described as 'unwelcome' submarines.
He seems to think that UK ports do not accept such submarines, which are then sent to Gibraltar.
But if there is a further visit, he will organise the biggest demonstration seen in the Campo area.
He did not say if he will also use his energy to launch a major demonstration against the constant pollution emenating from industrial plant in his own Campo area.
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