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UN consensus says that the tripartite talks are separate to the Brussels process
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The annual UN consensus on Gibraltar says that the tripartite talks are separate to the Brussels process, which supports the Spanish view that Brussels is not dead and buried.
Only yesterday we reported on a book published by the Spanish foreign ministry which says that Brussels is alive - and waiting to kick!
The Spanish government will not give up its sovereignty claim, and will use the Brussels agreement of 1984 to negotiate bilaterally with Britain.That's what the Spanish foreign ministry says.
AS IN THE PAST
Now, the UN consensus follows the lines it has taken in the past, urging London and Madrid to come up with a definitive solution to what they call 'the Gibraltar problem', taking into account the interests and aspirations of the residents of the territory.
According to Spanish reports, the resolution goes on to say that negotiations in the tripartite forum are separate to the negotiating process of sovereignty between Spain and the UK, agreed in Brussels in 1984 and in Madrid in 2004.
Given that Britain and Spain had accepted the resolution by consensus, none of the members of the UN general assembly objected to it, and it was thus once again adopted.
In the Fourth Committee last week, the head of the UK delegation Sir John Sawers restated that the British government reaffirms its long-standing commitment to the people of Gibraltar that the UK will never enter into arrangements under which the people of Gibraltar would pass under the sovereignty of another State against their wishes.
"Her Majesty's Government therefore confirms that it would not enter into a process of sovereignty negotiations with which Gibraltar is not content," he added.
And said that "given these previously stated commitments, while this year the UK will again be part of the consensus decision on Gibraltar, any reference to the Brussels process needs to be understood in this context. In the light of this, the implications of Gibraltar's well-known view of the Brussels process, as regards to both sovereignty and bilateralism between Spain and the UK, are clear."
POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE
This means that the Brussels process may be as good as dead even if the Death Notice has not been published. That may be the positive side of things for Gibraltar, and we have to be careful what we say as the Chief Minister will use PANORAMA's opinions in an election campaign for his partisan benefit.
However, there is a negative downside. It was hoped when the tripartite forum was announced that the trilateral process would replace Brussels which is a bilateral process. But this has not happened in real terms.
What most people would have liked is for the Brussels agreement to have come to an end, but it is being kept alive in the hope that one day the people of Gibraltar might change their tune, and suddenly be 'content' with it. The Spanish think they can arrive at such a position via the tripartite forum.
If that ever happens, the negotiations on sovereignty would take place and nobody knows where they would end.
Further, no one can forget how a UK foreign minister, Jack Straw, decided he would negotiate the on the sovereignty of Gibraltar with Spain despite that the solemn assurance on sovereignty was in the Preamble to the previous Constitution.
Up till then, the Preamble had been held as the UK doctrine on Gibraltar, both in letter and in spirit.
Having gone through that experience, many in Gibraltar understandably adopt a cautious posture on any new utterings on sovereignty, even if on the surface there appears to have been a strengthening of the UK position.
What matters in international terms are the resolutions of the UN. Gibraltar goes there every year to put forward strong and valid arguments, but a few days later the same, old resolution gets approved!
And that's that.
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