MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Gibraltar-Spain air cooperation improving

Spain's refusal to allow last Wednesday's diverted Monarch Air flight to go straight to Gibraltar airport from Malaga does not reflect any change of policy on Spain's part, according to Jose Pons, the Spanish Foreign Ministry's Director for Europe, reports the Gibraltar Chronicle.

Mr. Pons said there was no novelty in this and that what Madrid had authorised had been the use of Malaga as an alternative when aircraft could not land at Gibraltar. "This was done", he emphasized.

Following the September incident, when a GB Airways flight was allowed to fly straight back, Chief Minister Peter Caruana said the direct flight from Malaga was a development that could be read in the context of the improved climate created by the tripartite process of dialogue.

A year ago almost to the day the Anglo-Spanish statement that started the tripartite process, UK, Spain, Gibraltar, stated in its annex that Spain would "allow the inclusion of Spanish airports as alternative airports in the flight plans whose final destination is the airport of Gibraltar".

But Mr. Pons emphasised that direct flight for diverted aircraft were only being considered on a case by case basis and that in the September incident this had been in the context of the Gibraltar radar being down and a diversion after landing had not been possible because of the weather.

"We did not convert it into a norm although we are working towards making this possible," he said explaining that this would be envisaged in the context of an overall airport agreement.

"There is no change in the Spanish position" and people should not read any "strange manoeuvres" into the Wednesday decision.

Apparently when the Monarch flight arrived in Malaga the report was that of low visibility in Gibraltar.