MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Labour MP asks Argentina to respect Falklanders rights

Labour MP for Chorley, Lindsay Hoyle in an open letter sent to his Argentine colleagues published Sunday in Buenos Aires “La Nación” said it's hard to understand how a country so committed to human rights “can deny those same rights to the people of Malvinas/Falklands”.

The letter was addressed to the political members of the Argentine Lower House Parliament Observatory recently created with the purpose of intensifying and promoting through academic and political contacts Argentina's sovereignty claims over the Falklands and other South Atlantic islands.

"As a member or Parliament and colleague of yours, I applaud the project you have launched and which is designed to promote communications and dialogue on the Malvinas/Falklands islands. The history of the world shows us that without understanding and dialogue we can never reach agreements", says MP Hoyle who then recalls he visited the Argentine Congress last November when he met with members of the Foreign Affairs Committee and talked "face to face about fundamental values and multiple interests which we share and over the only issue that divides us, the South Atlantic".

"Human rights were the main issue of our joint agenda", says MP Hoyle underlining how much Argentina has suffered and how much Argentines have fought to have human rights respected and acknowledged "as the essential value on which rests your democracy". Plus the fact Argentina was chosen as full member of the United Nations Human Rights Committee, reinforcing even more the country's commitment.

"Therefore it's hard to understand the policy of the Argentine government of denying those rights to a group of people. That group of people is the people of the Malvinas/Falklands islands. We talked about that in November. I perceived how strong is the belief that the South Atlantic islands must be part of Argentina".

In the framework of that dialogue, MP Hoyle requests the members of the Parliament Observatory to reflect closely on the other point of view. In a world where the two countries send troops on peace missions to defend our liberties and our rights, "is it fair that we should disregard the wish freely expressed of the Islanders to decide their own future?"

This is the crux of the matter, "we can debate whether the Islands are a colony, who inhabited them in 1833, who first claimed the territory and when. But whatever the replies to these answers we must never forget that it's not a simple academic exercise. There are 2.500 human beings living in the Malvinas/Falklands. Do we want to be responsible for the violation of their rights? Or do we prefer to take the arduous path of finding a way to live together as neighbours in harmony and respecting the values that Argentina and the United Kingdom profess?"

Tory MP reminds Argentina of the "bloody nose"

But not all British MPs are conciliatory. Nicholas Winterton, the Conservative MP for Macclesfield, chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on the Falkland Islands is unimpressed by the new "Malvinas" Argentine push and recalls that "Argentina got a bloody nose 25 years ago and similarly I would advise them not to try again".

In a long article published Saturday by The Guardian and titled, "Argentina ups the ante in new battle over Falklands", MP Winterton is quoted as a strong supporter of the Islands and their strategic importance for the United Kingdom.

According to The Guardian, Britain deploys 1,200 military personnel to protect the estimated 2,600 islanders, at a cost of £110m a year. Is it worth it?

Mr Winterton says yes, arguing the Islanders have a right to decide their own future plus the strategic importance of the Islands, standing as the gateway to Antarctica.

Besides Argentina is historically wrong in claiming the Falklands and Britain is in debt with the Islanders for their participation in both world wars, "this outweighs the cost" said MP Winterton, quoted in The Guardian.

The Foreign Office line on sovereignty talks with Argentina is that "the United Kingdom will not negotiate on sovereignty unless and until the Islanders wish it".

Argentina protests Falklands' fisheries policy

Argentina complained bitterly over the weekend about the new Falkland Islands long term fishing licences saying they were tantamount to an "illicit and unilateral long-term decision on fishing resources in maritime spaces around the Malvinas islands" particularly since they are "subjected to a sovereignty controversy".

The Falkland Islands government new fisheries policy with licences extending up to 25 years became effective Saturday July first. The policy has the full support of the British Foreign Office and follows on the experience of Australia and New Zealand which rests conservation on the licensees.

The official Argentine Foreign Affairs release argues that the decision is contrary to resolution 31/40 of the UN General Assembly that urges both countries to refrain from adopting unilateral modification in the situation as the Islands undergo a decolonization process recommended by the UN General Assembly resolutions.

The statement reproduced by state-run news agency Telam added that the adoption of new fishing licences "is incompatible with the bilateral understandings over cooperation fro the conservation of fishing resources and does not correspond the cooperation spirit that must prevail within the South Atlantic Fishing Committee".

It also reaffirmed its sovereignty claims over the South Georgias, the South Sandwich and their surrounding sea areas. Finally the release reaffirms the need to abide by resolutions of the United Nations and the Organization of American States (OAS) that urge the Argentine and British governments to resume bilateral negotiations, aiming to find as soon as possible a fair, peaceful and lasting solution to the controversy over the Islands' sovereignty.

This has been interpreted by the Argentine press as meaning that resumption of sovereignty talks has become the condition to preserve existing agreements on fisheries and oil, among others, agreed under the "sovereignty umbrella" reached during the administration of former president Carlos Menem.

Argentine Foreign Affairs Minister Jorge Taiana had already denounced the fishing licences before the United Nations Decolonization Committee in mid-June. Besides last year Argentina submitted fifteen notes of protest to the UK rejecting what it described as illegitimate acts in the Malvinas, including surveying for hydrocarbons and the granting of licences for the exploration and exploitation of minerals

However a spokesperson for the British Embassy in Buenos Aires has said that the United Kingdom will not negotiate on sovereignty "unless and until the Islanders wish us to do so".

President Nestor Kirchner, a former governor of Santa Cruz and mayor of Rio Gallegos, just across from the Falklands succinctly summed up the new approach last April 2 when he spoke at the annual remembrance service for the dead of the 1982 war.

"The Malvinas must be a national objective (cause) of all Argentinians, and with dialogue, diplomacy and peace we must recover them for our homeland. But dialogue, diplomacy and peace do not mean we have to live with our head bowed".

The British privately have reacted saying that the renewed proactive Malvinas policy is much motivated by domestic policy and President Kirchner's reelection bid next year and expect the situation to become louder as October 2007 draws closer.