MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Falklands Governor states the British case and issues an invitation.
On Tuesday morning, Mr. Howard Pearce, the Governor of the Falkland Islands, chose the platform of a meeting organized for farmers by the Falkland Islands Rural Business Association to issue a firm assurance that any attempts that might be made by Argentina to discuss Falkland Islands sovereignty with the British Government would be refused, unless they occurred with the consent of the islanders. “The British Government is going to be very robust on this,” he said.
Stating that the relationship with Argentina "takes up a fair amount of my time" Mr. Pearce gave a brief review of twelve months in which the new Argentine government under President Kirchner had lived up to its early promise to bring the Falklands to a prominent position in its agenda, even if this had been done "in a not very helpful way."
The sequence of events described briefly by the Governor began with the banning of charter flights to the Islands last November and the announcement of the Argentine desire to begin direct scheduled flights. That, Mr. Pearce said, had led to "a series of exchanges that got us nowhere fast" and was followed up by diplomatic activity arising from Argentine accusations regarding the carriage of nuclear weapons in the South Atlantic by 1982 British Task Force ships. In April of this year a strong protest from the British Government was provoked by the appearance of the Argentine icebreaker Almirante Irizar in the Falkland Islands Fishery Conservation Zone (FICZ) where she had appeared to have been attempting to harass fishing vessels. More recently, Argentina had authorized two of its airlines to fly to the Falklands and although practical co-operation at scientist level remained a feature of the South Atlantic Fisheries Commission, where there is Falkland Islands representation, the quality of diplomatic contact had deteriorated over the last year.
Mr. Pearce surmised that the reason for this sequence of events might be President Kirchner's declaration that coming from Santa Cruz Province in Patagonia, the Falklands issue was close to his heart or it might simply that he considered it would give him a measure of domestic political approval. What the Governor said appeared to be clear, however, was that President Kirchner and the people around him mistakenly thought that they could pressure the British Government into talking about sovereignty. A key objective of the British Government was "to make it clear that this is not up for negotiation." The only basis for a decent relationship was, he said, to accept this as fact and focus on the issues where we can cooperate in a practical way.
Given the background of recent events, Mr. Pearce said that it was "difficult to be optimistic about cooperation in practical areas" and that some difficult months might lie ahead.
Having opened his remarks to the members of the Rural Business Association by stating his intention to visit every farm and settlement on the Falkland Islands "to get a sense from you in the places where you are living of what your life is like and what your pre-occupations are" His Excellency concluded his address by issuing an invitation "to everyone in the Islands" to attend a party on the afternoon of the 21st October, to celebrate his marriage on that day to Miss Caroline Thomee.
John Fowler - Stanley
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