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Falklands suffer the first Argentine attack of the 2010 cyber war

Monday, February 22nd 2010 - 01:21 UTC
Full article 198 comments

The Falkland Islands suffered a first cyber-war attack from Argentine hackers who hijacked the website of the Falkland Islands' weekly, Penguin New, posting reasons why the disputed Islands should belong to Argentina rather than Britain. Read full article

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  • Khh

    Wow! They hacked the penguin news. Whatever next?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:41 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Khh

    Falklands Islands Forever Bitches!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:59 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • exocet82

    I am so proud of our NERDS!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:08 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    Is this the forum of idiots? someone have a good idea to end the Malvinas problem?? Please go back at home with your family war games....

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:10 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • SUBZERO

    ENGLAND GOT OWNED

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:25 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • asdf

    LEAVE BRITNEY AND MALVINAS ALONE!!!,

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:33 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • john

    NERDS TIME ! TX FIRST YOU MUST TALK SPANISH CORRECTLY “ABLA” IS WITH “H” “HABLA” INFRADOTADO!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:37 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • john

    TX YOU ARE A POOR ARGENTINE! HA HA HA THE NEXT TERRITORRY WILL BE TIERRA DEL FUEGO FOR US.... LOSER!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:43 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Risk

    la lucha entre paises es igual a la lucha entre equipos de futbol solo con mas sangre

    the struggle between countries is equal to the fight between soccer teams only with more blood

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:53 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Nicholas

    che idiots, they are getting desperate. this just proves again how pathetic those so called patriots are. I believe it's time to wipe out Argentina for good.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:39 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Naty

    Why so much verbal violence? These are things that concern our governments only for economic reasons. We, citizens, are the ones who always have to pay.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:55 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • llen

    Naty, you are wrong... these are not merely things that concern our governments for economic reasons. And you can see in Argentina that citizens are ready to get fully involved, may be more than politicians are. I´m a simple 50 years old housewife, a very common citizen, and honestly, I´m sick of the spoliation and robbery of our land.... because, whoever like it or not, Malvinas is OUR land. It is very naif from the “falklanders” to ever think that they can have a peacefull and nice life in a land that belongs to another country. This does not mean war; I´m not for war... but there are many other things we can do, not the government, but the people, and it´s time to start doing them... We have plenty of time, and no matter how long it takes, we will get our land back.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 06:38 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Johnny

    Nothing has changed...the press has over exaggerated the problem once again. Argentina is voicing its claim again and again...whats new? The press needs to leave the islanders alone not argentina. The falklands is british, always has been, argentina dispute this claim and are going through the proper channels. Remember this...there are argentinians as well as Brits living on the island. Leave them in peace.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:21 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • 14th June

    llen, you are about the right age to have been brainwashed. The symptoms are quite obvious, go get some treatment then come back and see us when you are better, along with the rest of your deluded country people.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:27 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • J.A. Roberts

    I love the way you Argies all get together for a circle jerk because a website has been hacked... meanwhile in the Falklands the first drill bit starts its work.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:49 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Emiliano 21

    Lamentablemente las condiciones son muy similares a 1982, tal ves mas sombrías y negras casi como “el petroleo” porque ahora el imperialismo está en voga y actúa sin escrupulos. Necesitamos un mundo multipolar con urgencia o uno a uno los países del tercer mundo iremos cayendo como insectos victimas del insaciable capitalismo.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:44 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Arron

    The islands haven't even had an Argentine (pseudo Spanish) presence on them for 10 whole years - ever. How daft are these Argentines? International law governs what is yours - and international waters are limited to 12 miles. The rest of the world understands this. On Argentine logic, clearly all Argentineans should return to Spain now! Give the land back to the native South Americans – you ridiculous, hypercritical people. Either that or learn to accept and get on with your neighbours.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 12:40 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    I'll translate it for him,

    Peluchin, basically spouts silly childish insults about monkeys, because he is lacking in intelligence to come up with a witty reply.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:09 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Bill Chater

    I was born in the Falkland Islands and am proud to be British. If you want to read what is put in the argentinean language just copy and paste into http://translate.google.com. Translate from spanish to English and hey presto! It does a really good job of showing what rubbish is being spouted here :)

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:44 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Luis Suriani

    looking for a friedn in the Islands, I´m Luis, i´m 33 years old, I leave in Mendoza, I have a winery and I would like to go there to fly fishing.<br />
    <br />
    Pls come back to luissuriani@hotmail.com<br />
    <br />
    <br />
    Take care.<br />
    Frome one men to other men.<br />
    <br />

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:47 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • peluchin

    Bill, if you are British, why dont you live in Eurabia, er, sorry, Europe?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:49 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Bill Chater

    Sorry, I can't, google won't translate gibberish. That what it is right?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:51 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • peluchin

    I say to you that google translate is for subnormal people. D o y o u c a n r e a d a n d u n d e r s t a n d e n g l i s h a l m o s t? Why I can read your gibberish and you can't understand my gibberish?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:55 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Please Osama Ben Laden, grab your toys and dop something in Florida this time. Seek Nicholas' address and just do it!!!!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:57 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • peluchin

    My loyal monkey Coco uses google translate, but I forgive her becouse it's a monkey, not a regular subnormal homo sapiens.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 01:58 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Bill Chater

    peluchin, can you tell me why you speak spanish anyway and not your native language? I don't speak spanish because I was born British and we speak English.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 02:05 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    All I hear is incoherant, ranting and raving, long on passion, long on rhetoric, short on action. Full of threats to bully a small island community, typical latin mentality, strong with the weak, as we found out the last time, weak with the strong.

    Empty threats don't impress anyone.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 02:27 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    comment #27 with his usual racism!!!! wannabe fünher!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 02:32 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • headhunters

    argies won world cup 1982 against germany , no one asked for the cup back because they won it , uk won the war in 1981 against the argies , we won you didnt , get over it , the falklands are british and will stay british , if you start again you will lose again , never underestimate the british , we will fight for our lands .

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 02:40 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Only racist and fascist rantings I hear come from your Jorge, keep it up, dear boy, you make the case against Argentina so well.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 02:42 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    No you fool. You are the racist here and your comment #27 among others prove it! Justin “Fünher” Kuntz!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 02:58 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • llen

    29 headhunters: Uk just won a battle in 1982... War has begun in 1933, when they invaded the Islands by force...and will finish only when the land fully returns to their legitimate owners, I mean argentine people. Our goverments know that we will not accept nothing less than that, and this is the reason why any “half compromise” traeatise will not stand. You should know that this is not a government thing for us... the only lost war is the abandoned one; and we wil never give up on this one... not now, not in ten hundred thousand years. About the claimed “self-determination” of “falklanders”, and by that I mean the british citizens living in Malvinas nowadays and their right to decide their nationality, its fine for me... they can stay in the islands as british if they want to, as many other foreign citizens that live happily here all around mi country. Or they can go bak to England, it's up to them...

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:18 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • bob

    no hackers, only lammers
    penguin news security fail:
    admin: admin
    password: 12345

    lol penguin news!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:29 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • J.A. Roberts

    What's a “fünher” Jorge?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:40 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • DoesItmatter

    It beggars belief that you can all be so rude to each other...chill. learn to play the guitar or something, so much better for the brain :)
    Peace to all

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:42 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • J.A. Roberts

    I don't know what you are talking about Llen. In 1933 the 5th generation of Islanders was being born in the Falklands - before most of your grandparents had even considered emigrating from Italy...

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:43 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • J.A. Roberts

    Oh, and another thing LLen. I think you should look up the definitions for “war” and for “battle”. I don't think there are any historians who consider what happened in the Falklands in 1982 a “battle”. It was a war, darling, and I'm sorry but Argentina lost it fair and square.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:46 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • doesitmatter

    With respect there are no winners in war.....both sides are losers

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:50 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    .....“With respect there are no winners in war.....both sides are losers”....

    Archibald brain cannot understand that.
    Fünher or whatever mistake in my writing is means Justin is a nazi.
    1982 was a war, but one with military hardware. War is not over. War as many things are in constant change.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 03:57 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Duke of Wellington, way back before Argentina was even a glint in anyone's eye observed that the only thing slightly more melancholy than a battle won was a battle lost.

    All I ever hear is how you'll never rest till you force the islanders to bend to the iron will of iron Argentina who has a really mean and nasty army. And how the islanders can either put up with Argentina strong arming or leave.

    Well I don't recall Argentina asking the Mapuche if they would mind Argentina expropriating Patagonia, or Paraguay whether Argentina could have large tracts of its territory, But apparently Argentines get themselves so worked up over an imagined sleight in 1833, they work themselves up into a state of apoplexy.

    Well this is the 21st Century not the 19th Century, it don't work that way any more. So we're just not impressed by threats in the slightest. And sorry Jorge but pointing out that a big country bullying a small country is a typical macho bullshit of being strong with the weak is not racism. It is however rascist bullshit of the highest order to tell a proud and noble people to get out of their homes because you say so.

    I think its about time, that completely illogically Britain should revive its claim to Port Desire and if they people living there don't wish to be British then tough, after all they're just implanted Argentine colonists on land that is rightfully British, so they don't matter. And if we don't get our way we'll be really rude and say nasty things at the UN about it.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:05 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Nazis? You should know more about that than me Jorge, Britain fought the Nazis and their morally bankrupt ideology. Argentina gave them refuge after the war.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:06 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • peluchin

    My lovely JAR, my ancestors was here about more than 10000 years, so, give me back that islands, that you stole, thieves.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • llen

    36 J.A.Roberts: Of course, I meant 1833, it was a misstyping.... what you call a “war” was just an episode in a long time war with ups and downs... the attempt to recovery control of the islands in 1982 was a stupid thing of our that time illegitime government, with no planification at all. That´s the only reason UK barely and hardly won that “little war” (if you want to call it so, I`ll give it to you.. may be it was a “little war” between a “long war”). But your arguments are like “Hey, I assault your house, violate your wife, strike your daughter... and I pretend to remain there eating your food till the fridge is empty... ¿Why do you refuse to get over it?”... Ha,ha... sorry, sweetheart; that just will not happen...

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • doesitmatter

    So....guitar lessons anyone ?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:17 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Nope, the Argentine claim is nothing like that. As you like analogies, the Argentine claim is akin to claiming your neighbours garden because your great great great great great great great grandfather once pitched a tent there with the owners permission.

    In 1833, Captain Onslow did nothing more than send a polite note asking the Argentine garrison to leave British territory. Nothing more. Contrary to the Argentine myth making machine Vernet's settlement wasn't expelled, simply because he'd asked permission first.

    The only people to violate anyone's wife were the Argentine troops under Mestivier, who after murdering their commander took turns at raping his wife. Nice people.

    So yes, get over it. And if you don't, really after a while we stopped noticing you belly aching about it.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:20 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Mapuche are from Chile and Southern Argentina, Jesus, don't you even know your own geography and history?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:21 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Yawn, not the pirate jibes, aargh.

    Seriously, stop it, we just find that shit really funny. Yes its supposed to be an insult but it doesn't translate across the cultural boundaries.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:23 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Yawn, empty threats, really don't impress.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:24 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    El loco, really cracks me up, do you think he'll burst a blood vessel.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:25 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • doesitmatter

    el topo and justinkuntz

    you guys are an absolute disgrace...you should both be ashamed of yourselves.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:31 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Why should I be ashamed, for what exactly.

    El loco, really the homosexual epithets are not in the leat bit worrying. Deeply funny but not in the leat bit worrying. I don't pretend to be anything, I'm just laughing AT YOU.

    Jorge,

    I notice you ignore the fact that Argentina invaded Mapuche land and took it by conquest, in the 1880s. Tell me, when did they stop with the bounties for Mapuche ears?

    The Falklands are to all intents and purposes a small country, they govern themselves and only look to the UK for protection from the neighbourhood bully. And I see irony goes straight over your head.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:41 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Justin, why don't you talk to Mapuches and ask them instead of talking crap here, you happily? married pirate

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:44 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    El loco

    I am a Scottish Heterosexual Republican Catholic. And Jorge I did talk to some Mapuche, a rather sad history really. Try learning about it sometime.

    I presume my posts don't get deleted because I don't resort to such base insults.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:47 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    I don't have a wife right now. Those are your kids???? you should test them. Still insulting my mom?
    And you know nothing about mapuches. Did you talk to them???? Surely you did not understand since you rusty spanish.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 04:58 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Oh I'm sorry to hear that about your wife.

    I'm not insulting your mum, I said she was a lovely lady. Thoughtful too, entertaining the troops like that.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:02 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • llen

    48 JustinKuntz: All you are saying is a complete lie... the only rapiests have always been the english troops. As everybody knows, they have used violation as a war technique along the history in many places: Ireland, Scotland; India, Africa, Asia ... shortly, all over the world.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:05 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    I think “El topo” finally could show us the real Justin. Or Would I say the old stupid Ernest Espencer! You sound very much like him, always insulting us.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:07 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • patrick20210

    Not take into account the views of “Justin Kuntz”, he is a known anti-Argentine, his opinions are tainted in absolute bias, bias that prevents him from taking into account the views of someone who has another opinion

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • doesitmatter

    Guys this is about the Falklands/Malvinas, not about your personal attacks. Please can we have some decency and respect for each other.<br />
    Thank you

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • llen

    And Malvinas is not a “country”... is only a piece of our land, in this time illegally occupied by a foreign country; just like Paris was occupied by german troops in the Second WW...

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Bill Chater

    The only time the Falklands was illegally occupied was between 2nd April 1982 and 14th June 1982 (14th June, you know, Liberation Day!)
    Justin, love your work, don't let the crazys get you down, hahaha.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:16 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Bill goes down on Justin! LOL

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:19 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • juan

    the malvinas are aregentinians because they are part of Argentina's continental shelf so thats why and another thing i am also awear of “the conquista del desierto” in 1880 and the mapuches are also claiming their land just like we are doing with the malvinas.
    and i am only 13 years old so i am sorry for any spelling mistake that i may have :S

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:38 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Tsk, here we go again, anything that contradicts what Argentina claims is labelled a lie, I guess that's how you live with the double think.

    Doesn't change historical facts.

    And Jorge, not one insult from me, just turning 'em back on you. Say hi to your mum, as I said lovely lady, thoughtful too.

    Anti-Argentine, moi? Nope,

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:41 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Stefania

    I'm 12, Juan, and I'm Argentinian, so I speak in Spanish: estuvo mal lo que se hizo con los aborígenes aquí, es cierto, pero eso no justifica lo que Inglaterra hace con nuestro territorio. No tiene tampoco que crearse otra guerra. Creo que son dos grandes países bien capacitados como para llevar a cabo una conversasión inteligente. Saludos.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:50 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • doesitmatter

    “Comments must be in English. Thank you.”

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 05:52 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Jorge

    Pirats time is almost over. They will have to take their luggage and go home in England. America is getting more and more united against invaders from the north. I write in English, because pirats are so ignorants that they don't understand Spanish. Boycott against british trash is just beginnning!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 06:01 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Stefania

    I'm sorry, really. I can speak in English, but not very-very well, because I'm a studient. I said: “I think Argentina and Great Britain are two big intelligent countries, so they can speak. It isn't necessary a new war. And, of course, about the Mapuches, I think we made this very bad, it's true”. (Sorry if I write wrong)

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 06:03 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • doesitmatter

    “Boycott against british trash is just beginnning!”<br /><br />
    <br /><br />
    jorge if you cant show any respect or decency at least remember that two children are online. Perhaps you could be a role model ?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 06:09 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Justin, Really, admit you wouldn't say so in front of me. Te aplastaría como a una cucaracha!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 06:10 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • doesitmatter

    stefania<br /><br />
    Your english is excellent. I do not think there will ever be a war. Let us hope that our countries can resolve this somehow.<br /><br />
    I wish you well

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 06:13 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Stefania

    Thank you doesitmatter! I wish you well too.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 06:20 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • J.A. Roberts

    No Jorge, you write in English because the rules of these comments say you must...

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 06:28 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Comment #67 is another jorge. May be Jorge Taiana.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 06:59 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    First time that I agreed Mr.Roberts ... “the rules”, like UK have to be respectful to the UN “rules” . If you cannot speak english go to mercopress in spanish forum, if UK could not fullfil the rules, they must leave the UN and create the British Empire again.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:02 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Hey nitro, you are right. Everyone should respect all the rules.
    Greetings from Comodoro Rivadavia.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:09 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    OK Jorge I promise I'll never say anything again about what a thoughtful lovely lady your mummy is.

    Stefania, nice to hear from you, 'tis a pleasant change to hear a thoughtful post from Argentine youth. Your English is fine. Guess there is hope for the future.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:19 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Anyone want to give me odds that 1982vet is no such thing. Never heard a vet disrespect a war memorial ever.

    I call Walt on that one.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:31 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • 1982vet

    You wouldn't win any bet on that one JustinKuntz.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:40 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HaHaHa

    Is it true the Argies now have access to computers wow times have changed, i remember when they used to draw pictures in the ground and lived in huts made out of old boxes and inter breed, what! oh! they still do that, you may be ok at football but your crap at war, UK Navy 2nd best in the world and dont you forget it!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:56 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    how stupid could be a person to use “hahaha” as a nickname!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 07:59 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • alex

    Malvinas were argentine, are argentine and will be argentine...at least in our hearts. Thanks to a government of drunk and coward generals that the argetine helped to build from 1976 on, we had lost all possibilities of having them back through the diplomatic way. Now, I suspect that the `Ks` are doing their best to draw our attention to this conflict in so that we forget about the worrying economical situation of our country. Instead of the 1982 war, a better solution would have been a government shared by Argentina and the U.K.; this will encounter us now taking profit of petroleum and other undiscovered resources.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:01 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    Isn't it kind of funny how Jorge keeps going on about British Nazis when he comes from the most fascist country in the world and does nothing but spout racist abuse?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:01 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    This is not a country wich ban inmigrants. This is one the few countries that made justice against the fascist dictatorship supported by USA and UK.
    The only racist here are you who banned argentines for entering into their own land almost 20 years.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:07 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • terminator

    Funny how the Argentinians never bothered trying to claim the Falkland Islands, when they thought it was only windswept, barren and full of only sheep and penguins !
    As soon as the possibility of oil and mineral prospects are discovered in Antarctica, BINGO ! They are suddenly the : 'dearly loved, long lost Malvinas '.
    Bugger off, Argentina, or 'machismo' will get you another bloody nose !

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:09 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    Jorge, I am Danish - not British - and you clearly have the intellect of a retarded fruit fly on acid. The generals would be proud of you.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Tornado

    Argentinians will lose against the sheer force and power of the UK armed forces now, we will not be undermined by your weak comments if you step the line with the UK you will deeply regret this time around, last time we let you off, this time we will not, plus don't forget the fact that we help your weak economy by buying your products which we can get from elsewhere, double whammy if you get this wrong

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:16 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    It won't be easy, you'll think it strange
    When I try to explain how I feel
    that I don't need your love after all that you've done.

    Have I said too much?
    There's nothing more I can think of to say to you.
    But all you have to do is look at me to know
    That every word is true.

    DON'T CRY FOR ME ARGENTINA!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:20 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Chavea

    You UK pigs we will take our islands and then we come and take the UK and we live in your big massive houses and take your fast cars and women and millions in bank and then make you come work for us cleaning our homes and picking up our dog mess, Argentinia is the 5TH most powerful counrty in world and we have tanks that go fast

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:24 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Luis Vernet

    In 1833 the british made the islanders take down the argentine flag...

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:24 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • llen

    87 Terminator: What are you talking about? We claimed Malvinas since the very moment Britain illegally occupied them... This is not about oil, al least for us. We are not the ones who invade another countries for oil or another kind of resources (like US and UK thieves did and does, like in Irak, Afghanistan, etc...)

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:25 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Little wennie terminator, we always claimed Malvinas. You are not informed!

    HenrikDK, you took offence because I told you the truth. You, europeans (not everybody) are the fscists!

    Tornado is full of sh*t. I could say China or Brasil if you want is helping our economy, not you. We don't need you asshole!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:27 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • owl

    jorge ...distract these drunk monarchist kids ..distract ..we trust you !

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:29 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    Chavea, I think you will find that there are already plenty of Argentinians in London .. but I don't think London needs any more cheap South American prostitutes.

    Jorge, it is fun to watch you wiggle on the hook and make a fool of yourself. You are such an imbecile. The generals would be proud of you.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:33 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Stefania

    Please, stop whit the offensive comments Argentinians and English. Are we going to leave in peace some day? The war isn't neccesary, please.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:33 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Sad isn't it, the one person behaving with any sort of maturity is 12.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:41 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • peluchin

    My loyal monkey Coco advised me that Mapuche are natives of Chile and in 1900 they invade Argentina because the chileans expulse them.<br />
    Now I have to take my horse and bring the food for eat at night. I have to hunt!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:47 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Stefania

    Thank you, Justin.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:53 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • terminator

    'We have tanks that go fast'
    Yes, I know, Chavea, they're that fast, we can't catch them !
    Just like Italian tanks, they have 16 REVERSE gears.
    Sorry, Stephania, I'll apologise to you (alone), because you are the voice of reason.
    The problem is, individuals with the mentality of Chavea, who clearly isn't alone in your country, and are in desperate need of a brain donor.
    When one Country starts to impose sanctions, it is unreasonable not to expect another to retaliate. This can only escalate.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:53 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Pablo Dima

    A messeage to all the people in Mexcio, Peru and Brasil you must join Argentinia to fight the British or we will inavde your country to for being coward and traitor, together south america can rule the world.

    Facts

    1. Spanish language was created in Argentinia.
    2. Argentinia has the best military in South Americas.
    3. Mexcio, Brasil look up to Argentinia as future World leaders.
    4. Argentinia designers designed the White House.
    5. More Argentinia people live in the U.S than U.S people.
    6. Argentinia has best football team in world, we even teach Brasil poeple to play.
    7. Argentinia proffessors designed Big Ben in London.
    8. Argentinia created Brasilian culture.

    LONG LIVE ARGENTINE AND OUR OILS,

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:54 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Maurico

    Tenemos todo el derecho de gritar a los 4 vientos porqué las islas Malvinas les pertenecen a los argentinos. La verdadera historia sobre Malvinas está en los archivos de la Cancillería Argentina. Allí encontrarán documentos históricos firmados y sellados por los británicos en donde ustedes podrán comprobar como los británicos se contradicieron desde 1833 hasta la fecha. No podrán refutar nada, porque los documentos delatan a los británicos. Lean “Malvinas, esta es la historia” del ex Canciller Nicanor Costa Méndez. Aparte recomiendo que Lean a Bonifacio del Carril, a Ravanal, a Petrella, a Tejerizo, entre otros capos que trabajaron y trabajan en la Cancillería Argentina.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 08:59 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    How can it be colonialism when the Falkland Islands have the guaranteed right to determine their own destiny? They can be part of Argentina. They can be independent. They can be anything they like, but they choose to remain British when no-one forces them to be.

    Will Argentina ever recognise that one fundamental right to self-determination .. the same right that Argentina exercised and which is now guaranteed by the Untied Nations? No, that is the one concrete fact in all of this which undermines every single argument being but forward in the bizarre nationalistic fervour of the warmongering Argentinian fascists.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:02 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    Pablo Please, change the quality of that you smoke.. (is it the same of Maradonna`s cigar?)
    Hayward, thank you

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:04 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Miguel

    Pablo conseguime lo que te fumaste argentrucho!!!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • j

    How many british trolls today uh!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:15 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Lo que fumó el otro de be ser un gordito de El Bolsón!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:16 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    How many Argentinian trolls today uh?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:18 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • terminator

    History lesson for all brainwashed Argentinians, which proves Britain's claim to the Falklands, predates the formation of Argentina !
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Falkland_Islands
    Read and LEARN

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:36 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Do you who the trolls are??? I've never seen you here before!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:39 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    “Do you who the trolls are??? I've never seen you here before!”

    Not my fault you only pay attention when you are spouting racist abuse and bizarre nationalistic propaganda, Jorge.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:42 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    In November, 1805, Prince Vasili had to go on a tour of inspection in four different provinces. He had arranged this for himself so as to visit his neglected estates at the same time and pick up his son Anatole where his regiment was stationed, and take him to visit Prince Nicholas Bolkonski in order to arrange a match for him with the daughter of that rich old man. But before leaving home and undertaking these new affairs, Prince Vasili had to settle matters with Pierre, who, it is true, had latterly spent whole days at home, that is, in Prince Vasili's house where he was staying, and had been absurd, excited, and foolish in Helene's presence (as a lover should be), but had not yet proposed to her.<br />
    <br />
    “This is all very fine, but things must be settled,” said Prince Vasili to himself, with a sorrowful sigh, one morning, feeling that Pierre who was under such obligations to him (“But never mind that”) was not behaving very well in this matter. “Youth, frivolity... well, God be with him,” thought he, relishing his own goodness of heart, “but it must be brought to a head. The day after tomorrow will be Lelya's name day. I will invite two or three people, and if he does not understand what he ought to do then it will be my affair- yes, my affair. I am her father.”<br />
    <br />
    Six weeks after Anna Pavlovna's “At Home” and after the sleepless night when he had decided that to marry Helene would be a calamity and that he ought to avoid her and go away, Pierre, despite that decision, had not left Prince Vasili's and felt with terror that in people's eyes he was every day more and more connected with her, that it was impossible for him to return to his former conception of her, that he could not break away from her, and that though it would be a terrible thing he would have to unite his fate with hers. He might perhaps have been able to free himself but that Prince Vasili (who had rarely before given receptions) now hardly let a day go by without having an evening party at which Pierre had to be present unless he wished to spoil the general pleasure and disappoint everyone's expectation. Prince Vasili, in the rare moments when he was at home, would take Pierre's hand in passing and draw it downwards, or absent-mindedly hold out his wrinkled, clean-shaven cheek for Pierre to kiss and would say: “Till tomorrow,” or, “Be in to dinner or I shall not see you,” or, “I am staying in for your sake,” and so on. And though Prince Vasili, when he stayed in (as he said) for Pierre's sake, hardly exchanged a couple of words with him, Pierre felt unable to disappoint him. Every day he said to himself one and the same thing: “It is time I understood her and made up my mind what she really is. Was I mistaken before, or am I mistaken now? No, she is not stupid, she is an excellent girl,” he sometimes said to himself “she never makes a mistake, never says anything stupid. She says little, but what she does say is always clear and simple, so she is not stupid. She never was abashed and is not abashed now, so she cannot be a bad woman!” He had often begun to make reflections or think aloud in her company, and she had always answered him either by a brief but appropriate remark- showing that it did not interest her- or by a silent look and smile which more palpably than anything else showed Pierre her superiority. She was right in regarding all arguments as nonsense in comparison with that smile.<br />
    <br />
    She always addressed him with a radiantly confiding smile meant for him alone, in which there was something more significant than in the general smile that usually brightened her face. Pierre knew that everyone was waiting for him to say a word and cross a certain line, and he knew that sooner or later he would step across it, but an incomprehensible terror seized him at the thought of that dreadful step. A thousand times during that month and a half while he felt himself drawn nearer and nearer to that dreadful abyss, Pierre said to himself: “What am I doing? I need resolution. Can it be that I have none?”<br />
    <br />
    He wished to take a decision, but felt with dismay that in this matter he lacked that strength of will which he had known in himself and really possessed. Pierre was one of those who are only strong when they feel themselves quite innocent, and since that day when he was overpowered by a feeling of desire while stooping over the snuffbox at Anna Pavlovna's, an unacknowledged sense of the guilt of that desire paralyzed his will.<br />
    <br />
    On Helene's name day, a small party of just their own people- as his wife said- met for supper at Prince Vasili's. All these friends and relations had been given to understand that the fate of the young girl would be decided that evening. The visitors were seated at supper. Princess Kuragina, a portly imposing woman who had once been handsome, was sitting at the head of the table. On either side of her sat the more important guests- an old general and his wife, and Anna Pavlovna Scherer. At the other end sat the younger and less important guests, and there too sat the members of the family, and Pierre and Helene, side by side. Prince Vasili was not having any supper: he went round the table in a merry mood, sitting down now by one, now by another, of the guests. To each of them he made some careless and agreeable remark except to Pierre and Helene, whose presence he seemed not to notice. He enlivened the whole party. The wax candles burned brightly, the silver and crystal gleamed, so did the ladies' toilets and the gold and silver of the men's epaulets; servants in scarlet liveries moved round the table, the clatter of plates, knives, and glasses mingled with the animated hum of several conversations. At one end of the table, the old chamberlain was heard assuring an old baroness that he loved her passionately, at which she laughed; at the other could be heard the story of the misfortunes of some Mary Viktorovna or other. At the center of the table, Prince Vasili attracted everybody's attention. With a facetious smile on his face, he was telling the ladies about last Wednesday's meeting of the Imperial Council, at which Sergey Kuzmich Vyazmitinov, the new military governor general of Petersburg, had received and read the then famous rescript of the Emperor Alexander from the army to Sergey Kuzmich, in which the Emperor said that he was receiving from all sides declarations of the people's loyalty, that the declaration from Petersburg gave him particular pleasure, and that he was proud to be at the head of such a nation and would endeavor to be worthy of it. This rescript began with the words: “Sergey Kuzmich, From all sides reports reach me,” etc.<br />
    <br />
    “Well, and so he never got farther than: 'Sergey Kuzmich'?” asked one of the ladies.<br />
    <br />
    “Exactly, not a hair's breadth farther,” answered Prince Vasili, laughing, “'Sergey Kuzmich... From all sides... From all sides... Sergey Kuzmich...' Poor Vyazmitinov could not get any farther! He began the rescript again and again, but as soon as he uttered 'Sergey' he sobbed, 'Kuz-mi-ch,' tears, and 'From all sides' was smothered in sobs and he could get no farther. And again his handkerchief, and again: 'Sergey Kuzmich, From all sides,'... and tears, till at last somebody else was asked to read it.”<br />
    <br />
    “Kuzmich... From all sides... and then tears,” someone repeated laughing.<br />
    <br />
    <br />
    <br />
    “Don't be unkind,” cried Anna Pavlovna from her end of the table holding up a threatening finger. “He is such a worthy and excellent man, our dear Vyazmitinov....”<br />
    <br />
    Everybody laughed a great deal. At the head of the table, where the honored guests sat, everyone seemed to be in high spirits and under the influence of a variety of exciting sensations. Only Pierre and Helene sat silently side by side almost at the bottom of the table, a suppressed smile brightening both their faces, a smile that had nothing to do with Sergey Kuzmich- a smile of bashfulness at their own feelings. But much as all the rest laughed, talked, and joked, much as they enjoyed their Rhine wine, saute, and ices, and however they avoided looking at the young couple, and heedless and unobservant as they seemed of them, one could feel by the occasional glances they gave that the story about Sergey Kuzmich, the laughter, and the food were all a pretense, and that the whole attention of that company was directed to- Pierre and Helene. Prince Vasili mimicked the sobbing of Sergey Kuzmich and at the same time his eyes glanced toward his daughter, and while he laughed the expression on his face clearly said: “Yes... it's getting on, it will all be settled today.” Anna Pavlovna threatened him on behalf of “our dear Vyazmitinov,” and in her eyes, which, for an instant, glanced at Pierre, Prince Vasili read a congratulation on his future son-in-law and on his daughter's happiness. The old princess sighed sadly as she offered some wine to the old lady next to her and glanced angrily at her daughter, and her sigh seemed to say: “Yes, there's nothing left for you and me but to sip sweet wine, my dear, now that the time has come for these young ones to be thus boldly, provocatively happy.” “And what nonsense all this is that I am saying!” thought a diplomatist, glancing at the happy faces of the lovers. “That's happiness!”<br />
    <br />
    Into the insignificant, trifling, and artificial interests uniting that society had entered the simple feeling of the attraction of a healthy and handsome young man and woman for one another. And this human feeling dominated everything else and soared above all their affected chatter. Jests fell flat, news was not interesting, and the animation was evidently forced. Not only the guests but even the footmen waiting at table seemed to feel this, and they forgot their duties as they looked at the beautiful Helene with her radiant face and at the red, broad, and happy though uneasy face of Pierre. It seemed as if the very light of the candles was focused on those two happy faces alone.<br />
    <br />
    Pierre felt that he the center of it all, and this both pleased and embarrassed him. He was like a man entirely absorbed in some occupation. He did not see, hear, or understand anything clearly. Only now and then detached ideas and impressions from the world of reality shot unexpectedly through his mind.<br />
    <br />
    “So it is all finished!” he thought. “And how has it all happened? How quickly! Now I know that not because of her alone, nor of myself alone, but because of everyone, it must inevitably come about. They are all expecting it, they are so sure that it will happen that I cannot, I cannot, disappoint them. But how will it be? I do not know, but it will certainly happen!” thought Pierre, glancing at those dazzling shoulders close to his eyes.<br />
    <br />
    Or he would suddenly feel ashamed of he knew not what. He felt it awkward to attract everyone's attention and to be considered a lucky man and, with his plain face, to be looked on as a sort of Paris possessed of a Helen. “But no doubt it always is and must be so!” he consoled himself. “And besides, what have I done to bring it about? How did it begin? I traveled from Moscow with Prince Vasili. Then there was nothing. So why should I not stay at his house? Then I played cards with her and picked up her reticule and drove out with her. How did it begin, when did it all come about?” And here he was sitting by her side as her betrothed, seeing, hearing, feeling her nearness, her breathing, her movements, her beauty. Then it would suddenly seem to him that it was not she but he was so unusually beautiful, and that that was why they all looked so at him, and flattered by this general admiration he would expand his chest, raise his head, and rejoice at his good fortune. Suddenly he heard a familiar voice repeating something to him a second time. But Pierre was so absorbed that he did not understand what was said.<br />
    <br />
    “I am asking you when you last heard from Bolkonski,” repeated Prince Vasili a third time. “How absent-minded you are, my dear fellow.”<br />
    <br />
    Prince Vasili smiled, and Pierre noticed that everyone was smiling at him and Helene. “Well, what of it, if you all know it?” thought Pierre. “What of it? It's the truth!” and he himself smiled his gentle childlike smile, and Helene smiled too.<br />
    <br />
    “When did you get the letter? Was it from Olmutz?” repeated Prince Vasili, who pretended to want to know this in order to settle a dispute.<br />
    <br />
    “How can one talk or think of such trifles?” thought Pierre.<br />
    <br />
    “Yes, from Olmutz,” he answered, with a sigh.<br />
    <br />
    After supper Pierre with his partner followed the others into the drawing room. The guests began to disperse, some without taking leave of Helene. Some, as if unwilling to distract her from an important occupation, came up to her for a moment and made haste to go away, refusing to let her see them off. The diplomatist preserved a mournful silence as he left the drawing room. He pictured the vanity of his diplomatic career in comparison with Pierre's happiness. The old general grumbled at his wife when she asked how his leg was. “Oh, the old fool,” he thought. “That Princess Helene will be beautiful still when she's fifty.”<br />
    <br />
    “I think I may congratulate you,” whispered Anna Pavlovna to the old princess, kissing her soundly. “If I hadn't this headache I'd have stayed longer.”<br />
    <br />
    The old princess did not reply, she was tormented by jealousy of her daughter's happiness.<br />
    <br />
    While the guests were taking their leave Pierre remained for a long time alone with Helene in the little drawing room where they were sitting. He had often before, during the last six weeks, remained alone with her, but had never spoken to her of love. Now he felt that it was inevitable, but he could not make up his mind to take the final step. He felt ashamed; he felt that he was occupying someone else's place here beside Helene. “This happiness is not for you,” some inner voice whispered to him. “This happiness is for those who have not in them what there is in you.”<br />
    <br />
    But, as he had to say something, he began by asking her whether she was satisfied with the party. She replied in her usual simple manner that this name day of hers had been one of the pleasantest she had ever had.<br />
    <br />
    Some of the nearest relatives had not yet left. They were sitting in the large drawing room. Prince Vasili came up to Pierre with languid footsteps. Pierre rose and said it was getting late. Prince Vasili gave him a look of stern inquiry, as though what Pierre had just said was so strange that one could not take it in. But then the expression of severity changed, and he drew Pierre's hand downwards, made him sit down, and smiled affectionately.<br />
    <br />
    “Well, Lelya?” he asked, turning instantly to his daughter and addressing her with the careless tone of habitual tenderness natural to parents who have petted their children from babyhood, but which Prince Vasili had only acquired by imitating other parents.<br />
    <br />
    And he again turned to Pierre.<br />
    <br />
    “Sergey Kuzmich- From all sides-” he said, unbuttoning the top button of his waistcoat.<br />
    <br />
    Pierre smiled, but his smile showed that he knew it was not the story about Sergey Kuzmich that interested Prince Vasili just then, and Prince Vasili saw that Pierre knew this. He suddenly muttered something and went away. It seemed to Pierre that even the prince was disconcerted. The sight of the discomposure of that old man of the world touched Pierre: he looked at Helene and she too seemed disconcerted, and her look seemed to say: “Well, it is your own fault.”<br />
    <br />
    “The step must be taken but I cannot, I cannot!” thought Pierre, and he again began speaking about indifferent matters, about Sergey Kuzmich, asking what the point of the story was as he had not heard it properly. Helene answered with a smile that she too had missed it.<br />
    <br />
    When Prince Vasili returned to the drawing room, the princess, his wife, was talking in low tones to the elderly lady about Pierre.<br />
    <br />
    “Of course, it is a very brilliant match, but happiness, my dear...”<br />
    <br />
    “Marriages are made in heaven,” replied the elderly lady.<br />
    <br />
    Prince Vasili passed by, seeming not to hear the ladies, and sat down on a sofa in a far corner of the room. He closed his eyes and seemed to be dozing. His head sank forward and then he roused himself.<br />
    <br />
    “Aline,” he said to his wife, “go and see what they are about.”<br />
    <br />
    The princess went up to the door, passed by it with a dignified and indifferent air, and glanced into the little drawing room. Pierre and Helene still sat talking just as before.<br />
    <br />
    “Still the same,” she said to her husband.<br />
    <br />
    Prince Vasili frowned, twisting his mouth, his cheeks quivered and his face assumed the coarse, unpleasant expression peculiar to him. Shaking himself, he rose, threw back his head, and with resolute steps went past the ladies into the little drawing room. With quick steps he went joyfully up to Pierre. His face was so unusually triumphant that Pierre rose in alarm on seeing it.<br />
    <br />
    “Thank God!” said Prince Vasili. ”My wife has told me everything!- (He put one arm around Pierre and the other around his daughter.)- “My dear boy... Lelya... I am very pleased.” (His voice trembled.) “I loved your father... and she will make you a good wife... God bless you!...”<br />
    <br />
    He embraced his daughter, and then again Pierre, and kissed him with his malodorous mouth. Tears actually moistened his cheeks.<br />
    <br />
    “Princess, come here!” he shouted.<br />
    <br />
    The old princess came in and also wept. The elderly lady was using her handkerchief too. Pierre was kissed, and he kissed the beautiful Helene's hand several times. After a while they were left alone again.<br />
    <br />
    “All this had to be and could not be otherwise,” thought Pierre, “so it is useless to ask whether it is good or bad. It is good because it's definite and one is rid of the old tormenting doubt.” Pierre held the hand of his betrothed in silence, looking at her beautiful bosom as it rose and fell.<br />
    <br />
    “Helene!” he said aloud and paused.<br />
    <br />
    “Something special is always said in such cases,” he thought, but could not remember what it was that people say. He looked at her face. She drew nearer to him. Her face flushed.<br />
    <br />
    “Oh, take those off... those...” she said, pointing to his spectacles.<br />
    <br />
    Pierre took them off, and his eyes, besides the strange look eyes have from which spectacles have just been removed, had also a frightened and inquiring look. He was about to stoop over her hand and kiss it, but with a rapid, almost brutal movement of her head, she intercepted his lips and met them with her own. Her face struck Pierre, by its altered, unpleasantly excited expression.<br />
    <br />
    “It is too late now, it's done; besides I love her,” thought Pierre.<br />
    <br />
    “Je vous aime!”* he said, remembering what has to be said at such moments: but his words sounded so weak that he felt ashamed of himself.<br />
    <br />
    *“I love you.”<br />
    <br />
    Six weeks later he was married, and settled in Count Bezukhov's large, newly furnished Petersburg house, the happy possessor, as people said, of a wife who was a celebrated beauty and of millions of money.<br />
    Hugo Chavez has asked the Queen to return the Falkland Islands to Argentina Photo: REUTERS<br />
    The outspoken Mr Chavez used his weekly television and radio show Alo Presidente to rally Latin America behind the cause of his Argentine counterpart Cristina Kirchner by making a direct appeal to Buckingham Palace.<br />
    “Look, England, how long are you going to be in Las Malvinas? Queen of England, I'm talking to you,” said Mr Chavez.<br />
    <br />
    Related Articles<br />
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    British cruise ship tests Argentine blockade in Falklands<br />
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    British firms could be hit in Falklands oil revenge<br />
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    “The time for empires are over, haven't you noticed? Return the Malvinas to the Argentine people.”<br />
    Still addressing the Queen, he went on: “The English are still threatening Argentina. Things have changed. We are no longer in 1982. If conflict breaks out, be sure Argentina will not be alone like it was back then.”<br />
    He described British control of the islands in the South Atlantic as “anti-historic and irrational” and asked “why the English speak of democracy but still have a Queen”.<br />
    Mrs Kirchner later sought to win new allies in its claims to the islands when she made a direct appeal for support at a meeting in Mexico of the Rio Group of Latin American and Caribbean countries.<br />
    Argentine anger is likely to increase after Desire Petroleum, the British oil company that has towed a rig from Scotland to about 60 miles off the north of the Falklands, announced on Monday it had begun drilling.<br />
    Argentina is attempting to hamper oil exploration, insisting last week that all vessels using its ports must now seek permission if they plan to enter or leave British-controlled waters.<br />
    Argentina wants other South American countries to impose its transport restrictions to the Falklands but it is unlikely to win support from those closest to the islands such as Chile and Uruguay.<br />
    If - as the drillers insist - large amounts of oil and natural gas are discovered off the Falklands, Argentina would lose out heavily if it were unable to provide refining and port facilities.<br />
    Chile, Argentina's traditional enemy, has long been a major supplier to the Falklands. An operations manager of a Uruguayan shipping agency who came out to Port Stanley on Saturday to discuss business was dismissive about the effectiveness of the latest Argentine decree.<br />
    Meanwhile, passengers from the British cruise liner Star Princess disembarked at Port Stanley on Monday for a day trip after the vessel reported leaving Buenos Aires with no demand for permission to sail to the Falklands.<br />
    Stepping on to the jetty for a few hours watching penguins or touring one of the battlefields from the 1982 war, passengers said the ship's captain had reassured them several days ago it was “perfectly safe” to get off at when they reached the islands.<br />
    However, Maurice and Sylvia Bellamy from Felixstowe reported some unusual Falklands-related advice had been issued over the ship's tannoy system.<br />
    “They told us we had to refer to the islands as the Falklands when we were there but as the Malvinas when we were in Argentina,” said Mr Bellamy, 74.<br />
    “And they also advised everybody to be courteous and not to wear anything with obvious Argentine symbols or logos on it if we got off in the Falklands.”<br />
    Email<br />

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 09:45 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    114 comment was not me!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 10:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Really?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 10:15 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Tornado

    “114 comment was not me!”
    no doubt 116 comment was not you either

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 10:15 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    jorge and #112?

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 10:21 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    Almost as convincing as the vapid Argentinian case for sovereignty over the Falkland Islands, Jorge.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 10:32 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • khh

    New facebook club to join, Britain does not bite, but fuck with the Falklands and he will give you a suck you will never forget.
    Now argentina go and play with your rattle!

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 11:18 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    There goes the neighbourhood.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 11:21 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    Envy khh. “keep falklands british” facebook group does not compare to “malvinas to argentina” or the other one “I can bet I can find...... who believe Malvinas are argentinians”. Too much envy.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 11:30 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Envy what exactly? That you're better at whinging than us, you can have that one.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 11:33 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • khh

    We should meet sometime jorge , maybe bring your sister.
    nicholas can come to. How many $$$ do we need to bring.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 11:37 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • islander

    moderator - please remove all non-english postings and those using foul language on both sides. Debate and Argument(even heated at times) is one thing-a good thing. - the childish attitudes and wordings from some are irrelevant.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 11:38 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    You are right Islander. Moderator should delete some comments including mines in order to keep this as before. I'm tired today, I had to tolerate insults from any unknow british who landed here by chance.

    *It will be easy to delete my comments since mercopress is used to it.

    Feb 22nd, 2010 - 11:49 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    If you don't like it Jorge, don't dish it out.

    Its that simple.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 12:01 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    You can insult me, but not my mother, she does not know you or this site. would you like me to start insulting your children????? I knew it. Then, donb't piss me off.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 12:10 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Jorge, treat me with respect and I will reciprocate. Simple isn't it.

    You have from Day 1 disrespected anyone who disagrees with you. But you don't like it when someone stands up to you.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 12:16 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    a little of history:
    THE TRUE HISTORY OF MALVINAS: In 1766, Spain acquired the French colony of Port St. Louis, and after assuming effective control in 1767, placed the islands under a governor subordinate to the Buenos Aires colonial administration. Spain alone maintained a settlement ruled from Buenos Aires under the control of the Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata until 1811. On leaving in 1811, Spain, too, left behind a plaque asserting her claims. On 6 November 1820, Colonel David Jewett raised the flag of the United Provinces of the River Plate (Argentina) at Port Louis. Jewett was an American sailor and privateer in the employment of Buenos Aires businessman Patrick Lynch to captain his ship, the frigate Heroína (Lynch had obtained a corsair licence from the Buenos Aires Supreme Director Jose Rondeau). Jewett had put into the islands the previous month, following a disastrous eight month voyage with most of his crew disabled by scurvy and disease. After resting in the islands and repairing his ship he returned to Buenos Aires. Occupation began in 1828 with the foundation of a settlement and a penal colony. This settlement was destroyed by United States warships in 1831 after the Argentine governor of the islands Luis Vernet seized U.S. seal hunting ships during a dispute over fishing rights. They left behind escaped prisoners and pirates. In November 1832, Argentina sent another governor who was killed in a mutiny. In Jan 1833 UK took advantage of those situations and invaded Malvinas.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 12:47 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nico-mingo

    Wow, so much hate here...some of the comments really sadden me...

    Don't you all get that we are all people, no matter where we come from?

    I am Argentinian, but I understand both sides of this conflict, I respect the fact that the kelpers don't want to be Argentinians ( Argentina is a really crappy country mostly becouse of our politicians but the people are at fault too, I get it). But regardless, you must surely be aware that the islands are geographically part of argentina, even if you don't like it.

    It would be the same if I took my neighbours house and claimed it as my own even if it was empty... it's not mine.

    And my family came from Italy 130 years ago, but nevertheless I am Argentinian and I can't say that I am italian and claim that my house is Italian ground.

    And please don't respond with hate, we must emerge from this conversations more enlightened, not fighting like animals.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 03:50 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • umad

    @nico-mingo

    If you really want this conversation to not be filled with hate, then you should reject people like Jorge, and Nitrojuan. Not only is there English terrible, but they spew insults after insults. When someone presents valid criticism, the only thing they do is compare them to Hitler, when a British official dies, they celebrate it. They are nothing more then extreme Argentine nationalist, and a disgrace to rationality and humanity.

    While the Falkland islands are close to Argentina, that doesn't mean Argentina has a valid right to claim the Falkland. After all, there are loads of British Islands, so why are the Argentine complaining about this one? No one complains over Bermuda, or that Island off the coast of Africa. Why this one?

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 04:31 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    well umad I have answer your question in lesson 1 : I invaded your Land, so now is mine? (XIX Century) , now our forum is in lesson 177, we evolve, and the question is How can we have a diplomatic solution with includes the Principle of Territorial Integrity (Argentina) and self determination Principle (XXI Century)?? If you have a mature idea, it is welcome!!

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 04:41 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • David Barrow

    ”well umad I have answer your question in lesson 1 : I invaded your Land, so now is mine? (XIX Century), now our forum is in lesson 177, we evolve, and the question is How can we have a diplomatic solution with includes the Principle of Territorial Integrity (Argentina) and self determination Principle (XXI Century)?? If you have a mature idea, it is welcome!!”

    Argentina could recognise that its claim has no basis in international law
    -It wasn't Argentine land. Argentina had not yet secured sovereignty over it against the still existing Spanish and British claims.
    -Argentina did not inherit the Falklands from Spain, at the time Spain hadn't even relinquished Argentina itself or any of its territories in the Americas, let alone its own claim to the Falklands.
    -There was as yet no Uti Possidetis Juris in international law during the period in question or at any time during the 19th or most of the 20th century. The first time a group of South American countries reached a formal agreement on borders was at the Congress of Lima 1848, from there it has taken a long time to get the rest of the world to accept the Uti possidetis juris principle, to the end of the 20th century in fact
    -Argentina never had effective control of the islands
    -No established country at the time recognised them as Argentine territory.
    -There was no Principle of Territorial Integrity during the time the events took place. How could there be, if acquisition of territory by conquest was not yet illegal. The Territorial Integrity Principle is a modern concept (post WWI) that does not have retro-active application

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 06:30 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • terminator

    Hi nico-mingo.<br />
    I must applaud your sentiments, however I must agree with umad, that you really have to control some of your ultra-nationalists, who seem to revel in hate, but then have no stomach for the repercussions.<br />
    As far as Chavea, and Pablo Dima are concerned, is there any chance of them teaming up to form a double-act for America's got Talent ?<br />
    I haven't laughed so hard, since 'Comical' Ali, in the Iraq War.<br />
    To use your own analogy :<br />
    Your family came from Italy 130 years ago, they didn't come with guns in their hands to invade, but came to live.<br />
    By the same token the 'kelpers' as they are derisorally called, also came to live. Therefore they're neither 'invaders' or 'pirates' any more than you are, and as such are entitled to self-determination.<br />
    nitrojuan, posted his very carefully edited 'history', to deliberately exclude any British involvement in the Falklands. Full marks for selective blindness there, juan ! <br />
    However he lets himself down by revealing the only true Pirates, were the 'businessman with a Corsair licence, Patrick Lynch' and his employee 'privateer David Jewett'.<br />
    As David Barrow points out 'you did not inherit the Falklands from Spain'. Indeed NO International Law exists to allow such usurpation.<br />
    If anything Spain has MORE of a right to claim the Falklands, than does Argentina ! (and to a lesser extent France, and they're staying very quiet on the matter).<br />
    You cannot pre-date a land claim before your country actually exists, so therefore the only two countries who could legitimately challenge British Sovereignty of the Falklands, are these two.<br />
    Incidently, the old 'Continental Shelf ' ploy is also a non-starter, what the sea-bed does or doesn't do, is irrelevent. Good grief ! Germany shares exactly the same land-mass as France (and none of it UNDERWATER), does that make Germany entitled to it ?<br />
    I'm sorry but your assertions simply do not add up.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 10:05 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    I am sorry, but I don't see the views of the likes of nico-mingo as being any less objectionable and offensive than the views of the likes of extremists like jorge.

    Why? Because even nico-mingo blindly ignores the fundamental principle of the islanders right to self-determination - their fundamental right, as a distinct ethnic group with a different language and culture to that of Argentina, to decide their own future - which is guaranteed by the United Nations.

    The only expansionist imperialists here are Argentina and anyone who blindly supports the bizarre Argentinian claim to the Falkland Islands.

    Britain doesn't force the islands to remain British - in fact it guarantees and defends their right to be whatever they themselves choose to be (even if that is to be a part of Argentina) - yet Argentina seeks to impose an alien language, along with an alien and utterly corrupt culture and system of government on the islanders (and has within the living memory of most living islanders attempted to do so by the use of violent force).

    It is a simple fact that neither the United Nations, nor any civilised country, will ever support the imposition of Argentinian nationality on the people of the Falklands (who are as much indigenous Falkland Islanders as most Argentinians are indigenous South Americans); so the only way Argentina will ever get their hands on the Falklands is by demonstrating to to them what a wonderful and equitable society Argentina is .. so that the islanders themselves choose to become a part of Argentina.

    Unfortunately, rather than using that sort of carrot to persuade the islanders, the Argentinians continue to revert to Neanderthal use of a big blunt stick ... a big blunt stick which the likes of nico-mingo still can't see anything wrong with and therefore continue to demonstrate just how reprehensible and out of touch Argentina continues to be.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 11:50 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    By the way when Argentina raises the 1958 Convention on the Continental Shelf, it usually neglects to mention that it never got round to ratifying the Convention. It didn't ratify the successor till after the Falklands War.

    Its retrospectively applying International Law it never subscribed to...go figure.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 12:53 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    Just to correct the detail of the point made by terminator.

    Spain and France are far from quiet on the Falklands.

    Not only is France an active supporter of the British position; but both France and Spain (indeed all 27 EU member states) have ratified the Treaty of Lisbon, under which the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands, the surrounding maritime spaces and the Antarctic sector are recognised as EU associate territories.

    In other words, both France and Spain have, in a treaty which came into force less that 3 months ago, actively recognised British sovereignty over the Falkland Islands.

    In fact, in excess of 100 countries (including numerous South American and Caribbean states, all 54 Commonwealth states and 27 EU states) both actively support the British position and actively recognise British sovereignty. The majority of the others have no stated position and have categorically refused to support the Argentinian position .. so in the bigger scheme of things, Argentina actually stands very isolated indeed.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 01:33 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • terminator

    I didn't say that I agreed with his ultimate aim, HendikDK, which of course I don't. Only that compared to a lot of hysterical Argentinians, he doesn't want another War about it.
    I'm quite willing to discuss the matter with anybody reasaonably sane.
    You're absolutely right that the ball lies squarely in Argentina's own court to persuede the Islanders what a wonderful country they have.
    Who knows ? Pre 1982 Invasion, it might have worked. I feel they have rather scored an own goal though.
    Are you surprised, JustinKuntz ?
    Argentina, being a bit like Humpty-Dumpty in Through the Looking Glass: 'When I choose a word, it means exactly what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less'.
    So basically anything which conflicts with THEIR version of the truth, gets ignored or twisted.
    They're not very long out of a Military Junta Dictatorship remember, so are well versed in being lied to and given a very distorted view of the World

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 01:49 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • terminator

    Ah ! Ronny, my son.<br /><br />
    You haven't let me down. Welcome to ' the Club '.<br /><br />
    Now we have the THREE Stoogies, instead of just the Dynamic Duo.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 01:55 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • hi

    You guys are thick...don't wish to get too analytical nor rude but really you are a disgrace! What hope does the planet have with you lot??

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 02:42 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • patrick20210

    OUT OF IRAQ
    OUT OF IRELAND
    OUT OF BELIZE
    OUT OF GIBRALTAR
    OUT OF THE FALKLAND

    THE BRITISH ARE THE SCUM OF THE WORLD

    MURDERERS OF MILLIONS OF PEOPLE

    No one wants

    LEAVE, OR WE GET A KICK

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 02:58 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • I Love You

    You are right “hi”....they are thick. Never thought i would ever say that but hey it's done !!

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 03:05 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • hi

    when I say thick it applies to both parties !

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 03:09 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Britain has already left Iraq
    Belize was independent in 1981
    Both Gibraltar and the Falklands are self-governing, Britain only provides foreign representation and defence.

    Please do continue with the ignorant ill-informed racist spamming of these pages, you make a compelling case against Argentina.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 03:20 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • HenrikDK

    Gibraltar has been British since before Argentina even existed. It wasn't even taken by force, because Spain ceded it to Great Britain in the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht.

    In 2002 the people of Gibraltar, most of whom are of Spanish decent were given a democratic choice (remember democracy .. that thing Argentina doesn't do very well?) about their own future ... and 99% voted to stay British. If the people of Gibraltar want Gibraltar to become Spanish, then Britain wont stop them.

    Same in Northern Ireland .. the majority of people there vote to stay British. Ireland recognises that and doesn't even claim Northern Ireland as Irish and if the people of Northern Ireland want Northern Ireland to become Spanish, then Britain wont stop them.

    It is a shame that Argentina hasn't yet become civilised enough to recognise such fundamentals as democracy; but keep spinning your banal nonsense, guys, because all you are doing is showing yourselves up as pig-ignorant oafs who nothing of which they choose to comment on :)

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 04:05 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • David Barrow

    “But regardless, you must surely be aware that the islands are geographically part of argentina, even if you don't like it.”

    Actually, no. The Falklands may be geographically part of South America, but they are no more geographically part of Argentina than Chile or Uruguay are geographically part of Argentina.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 05:36 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Geologically speaking their origin is in fact African. They're part of the African continent that broke off and drifted on the continental plate toward Argentina. If, as Argentina claims, they were part of South America they have moved against the drift of the continental plate.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 05:55 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • terminator

    Unfortunately all the funniest Argentinian comments are being edited (probably by the moderator, for the sake of decency)
    but the last one, had me in stitches !
    (see ' Tuco ' at the end of this clip)
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoNccwtxwwo&feature=related

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 07:24 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Alan

    Falklands are British territory and shall remain British forever..Rest assure, if Britain should need aid, Canada will be there.

    Feb 23rd, 2010 - 11:35 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Nicholas

    South America, Central America, Caribbean, North America=America. We here in the USA are US citizens aka Americans (the good) , The Falklands is part of the UK though self governed (2nd good people) like many more islands in the Caribbean, and Argentines are che idiots (the bad and misinformed) aka retarded...laugh.

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 04:46 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Dr Roberto

    Hello. I am argentine. Please excuse my eventual bizarre english. I would like to discuss some aspects with kelpers without cheap nationalism behavior. I pretend to make a rational discussion analyzing the entire situation of the conflict.
    I think that the situation is not so simply. Most kelpers, according to what I read, think that the position of argentina is ridiculous. Most argentines think that the entire control must belong to Argentina. So the reply of kelpers is in general something like “the habitants of the islands wants to belong Britain, not Argentina”. If there exists moral people in Argentina who are interested in this conflict, they cannot simply say “falklands must belong to Argentina” and never make reference to its habitants that are part of them, they are humans. There exist moral people. The “hate” of some argentines is with Britain, not kelpers. (“Hate” not with its literal significance, I don’t know other word in this moment).
    I recently read that Britain permits Kelpers to choose its governments. That they are independent. That Britain permits kelpers not only to choose its governments but also the country to belong. I entirely respect your decision to belong Britain. But I would like to know if you thought the reason of that “freedom” to choose. That is what I would like to discuss. What I am writing next is not an affirmation, just a thinking.
    Argentines cannot live in the islands, Britain doesn’t permit that. Only tourists can go for a short time. I think that is in total contradiction with the supposition that Britain permits islanders which country to belong. Britain wants Falklands to be habit by people who prefer to belong Britain, so actually there is no freedom. It is very simple. There no exists real question in asking “do you want Britain or Argentine?” when Britain assegurates that the islanders will respond Britain. In fact because of the choice of Kelpers Britain justifies the occupation ok Falklands in UN. But as you can see everything is well premeditated by England.
    Britain, thanks to Falklands, pretends to have more control in the ocean and in the Antartida, and that is a fact, it is not my brainwashed theory (you can check it on your own). That politic has nothing to do with kelpers well-being.
    It would be an exaggeration to say that Britain “uses” kelpers to make its own control of this part of earth. But I think you can realize that there exists lots of reason to pretend the falklands. Britain, after the stupid war, began to transform islanders into real british. I heard some English saying that before the war kelpers where considered “second citizens” in Britain. So, when the war finishes a good manner to improve the occupation is to make kelpers real britain citizens.
    My conclusion is just this: I don’t want to dispute your choice. I respect it. But I would like to know if kelpers did actually think the reason of that choice and if Britain really is giving that freedom. Don’t reduce everything to a fraternal relationship with Britain and the malicious argentines invaders. Britain has lot of interests that have nothing to do with kelpers. So make your own conclusion. As I say, the conflict is complicated.
    If I offense someone, it wasn’t my intention

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 04:50 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Stevie P

    Dr Roberto,
    No need to apologize for your written English, it's fine. Nothing you've said is offensive although, that said, I understand that Islanders aren't big fans of the word 'kelpers'.
    While I understand the point you're making, its based on the premise that Britain, and not the Falkland Islands government, controls immigration to the Falklands Islands. This is not correct. As the Falklands is a self-governing territory, the Falklands Islands Government (and not Britain) is responsible for its internal affairs, including immigration. Therefore the FIG, which is directly elected by the Islanders, determines who can reside in the Islands - not Britain.
    According to previous comments on this site from 'Islander', a number of Argentines currently live on the Islands so I don't know why you think that Argentines are not permitted to live there?
    As no doubt you are a proud Argentine, I have no intention of insulting your country but if you were a Falkland Islander and you were given the choice between a country that gives you the right of self-determination and another country that doesn't think you have any rights of self-determination (and invaded you not that long ago) - who would you choose?

    I also think its a shame that you have only just read that the Falklands Islanders directly elect their own government - is this something that is not widely reported on in Argentina?

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 08:54 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Argentines can live in the islands, there is a small but significant community there. The only reason there was any restrictions stemmed from the war your country started and the overtly oppressive foreign policy of your Government.

    To claim that Britain has brainwashed the islanders is utter crap to be blunt. Britain had no desire to retain the Falklands and the FCO tried many different ways to persuade them to accept a sovereignty transfer to Argentina. Britain doesn't have any interest in the South Atlantic, any and all revenue from the oil goes to the Falkland Islands Government not the UK; just like the fisheries. Argentina had the chance to take part in oil exploration till it chose to tear up the agreements. So to claim that the Britain is using the islanders to freeze out Argentina is utter nonsense. Argentina is missing out because your president chose to tear up the agreement that guaranteed Argentine participation, your Government has enacted laws that makes it illegal for Argentine companies to participate.

    Right from the very start it has been Argentina's attitude toward the islanders that has promoted the attitude in the islands. Did you know for example that the FCO persuaded the FIG to go to BA in the '70s to talk about integration? When they arrived they met such a hostile reception, they cut the trip short. Don't you think that their attitude might have something to do with the fact that a supposedly democratic Argentina constantly espouses that they have no right to determine their own futures and that they are mere “squatters”.

    Britain has devolved Government to the islands, in dismantling the former British Empire it has always had the policy of devolving power to allow people to govern themselves. That why the British Empire was dissolved without the wars of independence that marred the end of so many European colonies.

    Britain doesn't justify the “occupation of the islands”, Britain protects the rights of the islanders to choose their way of life for themselves. The islanders weren't considered second class citizens at all.

    And are you actually aware that the use of the term “Kelpers” by the Argentines is considered hugely offensive, akin to using “nigger”. Its considered offensive because its use denotes mere “squatters” in their own homes.

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 09:05 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Expat Kelper

    Personally I am proud to be a Kelper, no hijacking of the term by Argentina makes any difference to that.

    A Kelper is a Falkland Islander and it is a term that has been in use for well over 100 years in the Islands. (well before the Argentines took up their very recent interest.)

    I find their efforts to make it a term that denigrates Islanders quite amusing. It has no adverse effect on me whatsoever. I suppose they don't mind being 'Tinis' do they? Just about fits.

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 11:41 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • mylovelyland

    Just to add my comment here. It is true, Dr. Roberto, that there has been an increase of British citizens to the Islands since 1982, but actually the majority of that happened after 1987 once the Fisheries zone opened and immigration to the Islands increased. We also have a lot of St. Helenians, Chileans and even a substantial number of Russians living here. Economic development leads to immigration.<br /><br />
    The Falklands, like all British Overseas territories were indeed 2nd class citizens but since 1999 and the White Paper on OT's all inhabitants of OT's are full British citizens (although the Falklands were granted this right after the 1982 conflict largely as a sign of committment to the principle of self-determination)<br /><br />
    Our immigration laws, by the way, require ALL immigrants, even British, to apply for Falkland Island citizenship (Status) in much the same way and it takes a minimum of 7 years to be granted it<br /><br />
    And as for use of the word “kelper”...it didn't used to be an insult but as it has only been used by Argentines since 1982 and tends to come across as patronizing and disrespectful, we don't like it any more!

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 12:35 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Expat Kelper

    mylovelyland,

    Under your 'new' constitution there is no such thing as Falkland Island citizenship. You have British citizenship and/or Falkland Island Status these are two different things.

    When you do get your own citizenship and passports (Which you once had and gave up for 'White Cards') (as opposed to British passports) then you will have true autonomy and self-determination.

    No doubt you will achieve that in your own good time, I wish you well.

    If you have allowed the Argentines to hijack your Kelper identity and make a dirty word of it, and I do not believe that is the case as plenty of Islanders are still proud Kelpers, then this would be a truly sad state of affairs.

    Personally I think you should shout out loud your identity be proud of it and stuff the word Kelper down every Argentine neck, choking them on it.

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 03:27 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • David Barrow

    ”Britain, thanks to Falklands, pretends to have more control in the ocean and in the Antartida, and that is a fact, it is not my brainwashed theory (you can check it on your own).”

    Sorry Dr Roberto, but this also is nonsense. British sovereignty over South Georgia and South Sandwich, and Antarctic Territory has nothing to do with its sovereignty over the Falklands. If the Falklands became independent, it would not affect in any way British sovereignty over these places.

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 04:37 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    Dr Roberto #149.. you think like me , but when i was living in BA years ago, you have to come to Patagonia, study more about islanders behaviur, their resentments about us, their capacity of self suficent (they dont need UK help, only for defence), self subsistence (their world are sheeps, ships & fishing, and maybe oil), self determination (virtual), they have not the oportunity (that in Ushuaia we have) to access to an University to make a diferent opinion about a global community and their own close community.. Humans could not have a real opinion of the facts if he doesnt have anything to compare, example: if you dont study the root of this problem and the social-economic context of these facts , you can never find a real opinion about them (you are only watching the tree and not the forest), nevertheless you cant find an objetive opinion to islanders if they have never put in Argentine skins, and they dont interest that ! so that kind of diplomatic doesnt works with them.... like Di Tella in the 90`. Please Continue Participate (after studying about them) .
    mylovelyland #153 , are you talking about your lovely land island that is Great Britain ? For a moment, I think that you talk about our islands calls Malvinas.

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 04:59 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    THE HEADLINE OF THIS ARTICLE SHOULD BE : “ Falklands suffer ”. (stop).

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 05:02 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Dr Roberto

    Here I am responding to “Stevie P”, “JustinKunts”, David Barrow, ExpatKelper and “mylovelyland”.
    I didn´t know the term “kelper” was offensive. In fact in Argentina I think people don´t know that.
    I didn´t know the FIC controlled who can live in the islands. And I didn´t know there were argentines living there. But are they really citizens? Can they vote?.
    I am not proud to be argentinian contrary I read from Stevie P. Eventually I would be proud of myself of some aspects. I know the politics of Argentina are disgusting with the islands. Even if I could think of Argentina recupering the Falklands, the way would be integrating to them, being part of them, not putting stones in the road and trying to isolate the islands.
    I knew the episode in the seventees, JustinKuntz. Peron was the president at that time. I really don´t know exactly what was the proposal of Britain buy I heard that they propose to share the governation. Peron realize this was convenient in order to recover the islands, but the militars (2 years later) then had the actitud of all or nothing, the same militars that invade the islands in 1982.
    The actual politics of Argentina is less brutal but the entire concept is the same. As a person I don´t agree to isolate a community taking advantage of geography. But the thing I don´t entirely agree with JustinKuntz and Stevie P is what Britain plans. This is more general than the oil being extracted now. If that oil really helps your community then welcome it. But of course, if the predictions are good, 60 000 millons of barrils is a luxury business planed not just to the benefit of islanders. So even I know the britains are more hospitality than Argentina, they have other interests that, as I said, have nothing to do with islanders. Now please JustinKunts don´t interpret this as “Britain uses islanders to get the great prize”. They are not using you because they helped you in making progress. But luxury sectors with high power take advantage of that. And they are connected with the Britains governments so ... That is what makes me fell angry. Are you sure that the oil exploration is only for the benefit of islanders?. A stupid person would ratiocinate like “Britain make its luxury business thanks to the islanders that prefer to belong Britain”. If you JustinKunts think I rationate like that you are insulting me. My Brain is not washed. If I write something wrong, then correct me without insulting.
    Argentina has lot of economics problems. There exists a huge ilegitimal debt obtiened in the military government of 1976-1983 thanks to sectors much of them belonging to Britain. And the reason why the exploration is being realized now is because of the high price of oil. Everything well planed.
    Thanks to the “fear” of being invaded again Britain had worked in making the “condor project” disappear (in the 80´s). That project was thought to develop the cohetery. Unfortunately that technology is not very far from the one used to fire misils. Contrary as you perhaps think in Argentina there exists lot of scientist. Argentina exports nuclear technology with pacific purpose. Argentina produce high technological satellites, but thanks to Britain Argentina must pay NASA to put them into orbit. Imagine the benefit for the people in developing high technologies. This is not a place with brave landscapes, good meat and crazy people loving Maradona and Tango. The argentinian economy is controlled in an indirect way, Britain and others. Here exists poverty. Lot of things can be realized in ordered to fight that that are not related with the Falklands. But actually what is happening now is other demonstration of the economics interests of Britain that are much higher than the ones that helps the islanders.
    I am not accusing islanders. I am accusing Britain and Argentina too. My intention is not to put you in a moral dilemma. And of course the economics problems of Argentina are not the Falklands. My only intention is show that in this conflict there doesn´t exist the entirely good (Britain) and the entirely evil (Argentina).
    Please, JustinKuntz, don´t react as you do when some stupid insults you just because of my nationality.
    David Barrow, what you say is not entirely true. Everything is connected. Perhaps in other occasion we discuss that.

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 05:04 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • jorge

    All the britons who say I am a nacionalist:<br />
    <br />
    I don't care what you think or say about me, every insult or adjetive you put on me is music for my ears.

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 07:08 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • David Barrow

    “And I didn´t know there were argentines living there. But are they really citizens? Can they vote?.”

    There is no Falkland Islands citizenship. People born or naturalised in any BOT have British Citizenship or British Overseas Territories Citizenship after which they can apply for British Citizenship. However BC or BOTC itself does not give any right of abode, right to work without a permit, or right to vote, right be a candidate for elections, etc in any BOT, even in the BOT where the citizenship was awarded. To have these rights the person must have territory status, Falkland Islands Status in the case of the Falkland Island. Argentines can apply for Falkland Islands Status if they satisfy the criteria, and if they are awarded it, they can vote.

    “But of course, if the predictions are good, 60 000 millons of barrils is a luxury business planed not just to the benefit of islanders.”

    Well, the owners/shareholders of the oil companies will benefit. But, I fail to see why that's a problem if that's what your implying.

    “David Barrow, what you say is not entirely true. Everything is connected. ”

    I don't think so. Britain does not have sovereignty over those places because of its sovereignty over the Falklands

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 08:16 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • David Barrow

    'if that's what your implying.'

    should be 'you're implying'

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 08:18 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Dr Roberto, actually I said your claim the islanders were brain washed was wrong, not that you were brainwashed. In case you haven't noticed I don't have a particularly high opinion of the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the way it treated the islanders in the past. Having said that, Argentina created and sustains this conflict, rarely do you see Argentina trying to defuse tensions.

    Feb 24th, 2010 - 11:06 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Dr Roberto

    Ok JustinKuntz, sorry me then. I didn´t understand the episode of the “brain wash” and that you don´t have a good image of how british treated islanders in the past because of my English.
    David Barrow: You are not following what I had planted. You are just taking somo sentences and you answer then, perhaps my long messages are boring. The origin of my discussion was the position of Britain.

    “Well, the owners/shareholders of the oil companies will benefit. But, I fail to see why that's a problem if that's what your implying.”

    My discussion was the purpose of the Britanic empire. But apparently you don´t think that, why is that? One should think, as a member of Britain, why the most powerful countries act all over the world. As I always said I am not disputing islanders. Come on ... you don´t need to know lot of history to realize what the british empire always did. Now the way to influence in the world is different. I am just telling that. Britanics explorations there are a true example, why don´t you see it?

    Perhaps you are wondering the purpose of my discussion. You have to understand that I don´t pretend to change your mind in things related to sovereignty. And I am not defending the politics or not politics of Argentina with the islands. I just want to analyze the entire picture of the situation.

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 01:34 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    David Sparrow: Britain after their empire decline and after the Malvinas War, have created this virtual “title”” to keep the rest of their empire in XXI century around the world and be able to justify this... the BOT is only a BOAT of the big ship called BRITISH EMPIRE (that dont exist anymore).. only that. And thanks that kelpers are not a “second category citizen” anymore, now they are “toys” of UK to have a future claim in a “big water resourse” calls Antarctica, and now a bonus of oil.

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 02:14 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Stevie P

    Dr Roberto,

    I think one thing you're asking is why Britain is out there carrying out oil exploration etc. and what their purpose is?
    The problem I have with what your saying (and also how it is being represented in the press) is that Britain is not actually doing anything of the sort.

    Oil and gas exploration in Falkland waters is regulated by the FIG, not Britain. If you or I wanted to go out and explore for hydrocarbons we'd need an exploration licence from the FIG, not Britain. If we found commercially viable resources, we'd then need to apply for a production licence, again issued by the FIG, and not Britain. Any royalties or hydrocarbons tax payable by you or me for producing those hydrocarbos would be payable by us to the FIG and not Britain. Any revenue paid would be spent by the FIG on the islands.
    The companies that are carrying out the exploration ie Desire Petroleum may well be registered in Britain but they're not necessarily 'British' - their shares are listed on the stock exchange and I expect that a significant number of those shares are held by non-Brits.

    Believe me when I tell you that Britain does not make any money out of the Falklands Islands (and nor should it).

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 03:26 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • lucia

    Your Comment

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 03:54 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Well Dr Roberto, I can't actually add much to what Stevie P has added, he pretty accurately summarises the situation.

    The only thing I would add is that Argentine companies can't participate or benefit becuase it is illegal under Argentine law. The only reason the British company Desire is there is because the Argentine companies originally involved were withdrawn by Presidential decree.

    Sorry but the current situation is entirely of Argentina's own making.

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 10:31 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • NITROJUAN

    islander you have to change your “wishes” with “ reality ”, the problem is your people need GOOD & REAL FUNDAMAMENTS to do that, lamentably you dont have it.
    I want to give an offer to your people (before Arg. close the only link with the continent) , but i feel nobody is prepared to it...

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 03:34 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • khh

    http://www.falklandshistory.org/gettingitright.pdf

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 03:46 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • SBS

    Rule Britania!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    Rule Britannia!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    The nations, not so blest as thee,
    Must in their turn, to tyrants fall,
    Must in ,must in, must in their turn, to tyrants fall,
    While thou shalt flourish, shalt flourish great and free,
    The dread and envy of them all.
    (Chorus)
    Rule Britannia!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    Rule Britannia!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Brittons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    Rule Britania!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    Rule Britannia!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    The nations, not so blest as thee,
    Must in their turn, to tyrants fall,
    Must in ,must in, must in their turn, to tyrants fall,
    While thou shalt flourish, shalt flourish great and free,
    The dread and envy of them all.
    (Chorus)
    Rule Britannia!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    Rule Britannia!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Brittons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    Rule Britania!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    Rule Britannia!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    The nations, not so blest as thee,
    Must in their turn, to tyrants fall,
    Must in ,must in, must in their turn, to tyrants fall,
    While thou shalt flourish, shalt flourish great and free,
    The dread and envy of them all.
    (Chorus)
    Rule Britannia!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    Rule Britannia!
    Britannia rule the waves.
    Brittons never, never, never shall be slaves.

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 07:52 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • COWARDS

    US BRITS WILL USE OUR CRUISE MISSILE SUBMARINES TO HIT YOUR AIRFIELDS FROM THE SKY !!!!

    YOUR SHIPS WILL BE SUNK BY OUR ASTUTE CLASS SUBMARINE
    THE BEST ATTACK SUMBARINE IN THE WORLD

    CAN DETECT A SHIP LEAVING NEW YORK FROM LONDON , NOTHING WILL REACH OUR ISLANDS

    YOUR 30 YEAR OLD JEST WILL BE DESTROYED BY THE EUROFIGHTER

    OUR DARING CLASS DESTROYERS WILL DESTROY ANY MISSILE OR AIRPLANE WHICH REACHES THE ISLAND, THE MOST ADVANCE ANTI AIR MISSILE DESTROYER IN THE WORLD

    I WILL SEND YOU A POSTCARD FROM MY NEW HOLIDAY HOME BOUGHT BY FROM THE MONEY WE BRITS WILL MAKE FROM YOUR OIL


    HAHAHAHAH !!! HAHAHAHAHAHAH !!! AHAHAHHAHA

    HOW WILL YOU GET THESE ISLANDS BACK ARGENTINA HOW ? TELL ME HOW !!!

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 09:51 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Stevie P

    Cowards@171 - not sure what you're adding to the debate, other than revealing the fact that you're an idiot.

    See my comment above at 165 about oil revenues - any and oil revenue will go the FIG, and not Britain and will be used on the development of the Islands.

    Lastly and just as importantly - Brits rarely refer to themselves as 'Brits', they also use the word 'aeroplane' and not 'airplane'. If you were actually British you would know that.

    Feb 25th, 2010 - 10:28 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Christian

    For History and Geography The islands Falklands belong to Argentina but respect the people who live here. I woulk like my country has the same position as Spain with Gibraltar Llanitos don t consider britons although Gibraltar is one of the colonies of UK. <br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />

    Feb 26th, 2010 - 01:55 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Dr Roberto

    Dears Stevie P and JustinKuntz:<br />
    <br />
    There is no reason to think you are lying in what Stevie P wrote about the control of the Falklands. And I am sure that Argentina get away of the islands by its politics as JustinKuntz said. But, taking what Stevie P wrote, I think no citizen can knows exactly how acts the government elected. I am talking about every citizen in the world. Stevie P said that Britain has no interference in this oil exploration, just the FIC. How can you be sure of that? I am not saying you are wrong. But sincerely I can´t imagine a place where the politics process are so transparent to everybody.<br />
    I would like to make a good conclusion on this. It is just this: all my suspicions could be tasted if Argentina changed its politics with islands. JustinKuntz said “Sorry but the current situation is entirely of Argentina's own making”. As I said it is true that Argentina´s own making contributes to the situation. But I am not sure of the “entirely” (because of my doubts related with Britain). The only way to see this is wait Argentina to change its politics. It can be an eternity. But if what you are saying is correct, this could be better for Argentina and the Falklands.<br />

    Feb 26th, 2010 - 03:20 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Lauri

    I guess the Brits are still pissed off that the 2016 Cup will be played in S. America where the weather and people are gorgeous and the food and lifestyle is awesome!!!! Oh....and where that Football Cup has called home for many years!!! I would hate on S. America too if all I had was rainy days, overweight not so good looking people and CURRY...FISH AND CHIPS TO EAT! G ROOSSS! Vamos Argentina! Vamos Brasil!!! Woooh!!

    Feb 26th, 2010 - 05:32 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Lauri

    2014

    Feb 26th, 2010 - 05:36 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Lauri

    Apologies for being one of those idiots...I just read about this........<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    Argentina's 'Triple A' death squads<br /><br /><br />
    The arrest in Spain of Argentine Rodolfo Almiron has brought back memories of a dark chapter in Argentina's history - that of the death squads that targeted left-wingers before the 1976 military coup.<br /><br /><br />
    Mr Almiron is wanted in his home country for murders committed in the 1970s by the Argentine Anti-Communist Alliance, or Triple A - a far-right organisation responsible for hundreds of deaths between 1973 and 1975.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    It was set up during Juan Domingo Peron's third and last presidency by Jose Lopez Rega, then minister for social welfare. It continued to operate under the government of Peron's widow, Isabel, during which period most of the killings took place.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    At the time, the Peronist movement was bitterly divided between leftist and rightist members.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    Lopez Rega - known as “the Wizard” and sometimes described as “Argentina's Rasputin” - is said to have recruited followers from the police, the military, trades unions and right-wing sectors of Peronism.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    His main collaborators are said to have been the then police chief Alberto Villar, police superintendent Jose Ramon Morales and former police officer Rodolfo Almiron.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    Arsenal<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    On 21 November 1973, the Triple A carried out what was to be the first of hundreds of attacks against what it perceived to be its opponents, placing a bomb under the car of Senator Hipolito Solari Yrigoyen.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    The bomb did not kill him, and the group made another failed attempt on his life in 1975.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    Despite the unsuccessful debut, an official commission later found documentary evidence to show the group killed 428 people, although some estimates suggest the number is closer to 1,000.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    Lopez Rega used the generous budget he enjoyed as a government minister to buy huge amounts of weapons.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    When he resigned on 11 July 1975 - after being accused by the Peronist Party of instigating the Triple A - he was appointed special ambassador to Spain, and fled there.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    An arsenal including machine guns, grenades and snipers' guns were later found in his office in the ministry.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    The Triple A was dismantled although the military governments that held power between 1976 and 1983 shared and targeted many of the same “enemies”.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />
    Lopez Rega was extradited to Argentina in 1986. He died three years later in a Buenos Aires jail awaiting sentence at the age of 73.<br /><br /><br />
    <br /><br /><br />

    Feb 26th, 2010 - 06:42 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • JustinKuntz

    Dr Roberto, your reservations are to be blunt entirely based on a presumption that the British Government has acted in bad faith. You might like to consider that it is in fact your presumptions about Britishs motives that don't enable you to see through the fog of propaganda surrounding the issues.

    Feb 26th, 2010 - 09:11 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Dario.AR

    LAN CHILE SHOULD STOP FLYING TO THE ISLANDS
    BECAUSE CHILE UNCONDITIONAL SUPPORT THEN WE SAID WE ASK THAT thereby helping.

    Feb 26th, 2010 - 10:00 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • nitrojuan

    Dario #179, of course we can do it and more, but that is provisory, it isnt the solution... Us has blocked Cuba, what are the results??
    Matias #180, believe or not they have the capacity of self survival, different each state of Arg. that need Federal coparticipate to go on....I have not doubt about our sovereignity in Malvinas but you have to be objetive!
    Matias #180, lo creas o no ellos tienen la capacidad de sobrevivir por sus medios, diferente es lo que pasa en Arg. donde cada provincia necesita de la coparticipación federal para seguir adelante (y donde muchos gobernadores se regalan al gobierno central) ... No tengo dudas sobre nuestra soberanía en las islas Malvinas pero deberías ser mas objetivo.

    Feb 27th, 2010 - 03:52 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • lol

    The Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges memorably characterised the Falklands war as “two bald men fighting over a comb”. Now that a British company has begun to drill for oil 60 miles north of Port Stanley we can see that writers, even wise old Nobel laureates such as Borges, sometimes let a good phrase block out the light of a more considered understanding. The Falklands war was not, of course, “about” oil; of all the views of its rights and wrongs, only the Soviet Union chose to see it as a straightforward struggle to grab natural resources. But oil, or rather the prospect of its discovery in lavish quantities (“another Kuwait” was mentioned), coloured both Argentinian and British policies towards the Falkland Islands for a dozen years before the war broke out in 1982, and you might even argue that in a circuitous way helped cause it. If Borges had described the conflict as “two balding men fighting over a hair restorer – as tried successfully by millions”, he wouldn't have been ­completely right either, but he would have been be nearer the mark.

    The news that the seabed around the Falklands might contain rich oil deposits was first conveyed to a British government in 1969. Richard Crossman, then a member of the cabinet, recorded in his diary his surprise at the fact that “the Foreign Office said that the only thing to do was to conceal the suggestion and prevent any testing”. What the FCO feared was that exploration would aggravate the territorial dispute with Argentina. In public, British politicians maintained a show of confidence in Britain's legal sovereignty over the islands, just as they do again now in the face of Argentinian protests over the drilling rig in the north basin. In private, they were less sure. In 1936, John Troutbeck, head of the FCO's American department, wrote a memo summarising the problem. The difficulty of Britain's position was that “our seizure of the Falkland Islands in 1833 was so arbitrary a procedure as judged by the ideology of the present day. It is therefore not easy to explain our possession without showing ourselves up as international bandits.”

    Increasingly the British claim depended not on treaties and claims, but on a doctrine in international law known as “prescription”, which allows that ownership can arise out of long-term occupation. In the anti-colonial mood of the postwar decades, this played less well but at least in the Falklands no indigenous population had been suppressed or expunged. The Falklands had been settled by people of almost entirely British stock since the 1840s and whenever their opinion was tested the message came back that British was what they wanted to remain.

    They held a traditional view of sovereignty – what the American scholar Lowell S. Gustafson called “hard sovereignty”, meaning the single ownership of a territory under one flag. Many in Argentina held the same view – they simply wanted to plant a different flag. The quarrel had been irreconcilable for more than a century with little harm done, but in the 1970s the prospect of oil wealth made the search for compromise more urgent. By 1975, 50 oil companies had applied to Britain for exploration rights. Faced with shriller Argentinian demands for negotiations on the transfer of sovereignty, with war a possibility if they were refused, Britain stalled. This angered Falkland islanders who wanted economic development. In London and Buenos Aires, officials and a few of the less nationalist politicians felt their way towards a solution – “soft sovereignty”, meaning joint ownership by condominium or a leaseback deal in which sovereignty was conceded to Argentina but Britain for most practical purposes carried on as the owner.

    Leaseback eventually became the policy that the Thatcher government tried to sell to the islanders, with Nicholas Ridley its most inept salesman. They had been neglected for years; the Falklands were essentially company islands, peopled by tenants of the Falkland Islands Company, which made profits from the wool of 600,000 sheep and left mutton behind as the diet. Lord Shackleton, commissioned in 1975 to investigate the islands' economic future, reproved the company and the British government for their lack of investment and noticed that the people, while honest and physically hardy, had “a degree of acceptance of their situation which verges on apathy”. Later he told me, not quite correctly in view of what happened in Diego Garcia: “If these people had been black, Britain would never have got away with it.” And you could see what he meant: the condition of 1,800 people 8,000 miles away had never much concerned liberals, though it was beginning to anger patriots.

    When I went there in 1978, Britain had been trying to introduce the Falklands to the idea of co-operation with Argentina for several years. Every civilian visitor and every piece of airmail landed there by permission of Buenos Aires' military junta, which owned the airline and issued the visas. Likewise Argentina's state-owned oil firm shipped in all the islands' fuel. A few Argentinians even lived there, including two young women sent out to teach children Spanish. But if anything Argentina grew steadily more feared and hated. One day I complimented Stanley's magistrate on the portrait of the Queen above his bench. “Yes, so much better than the famous one by that Italian chap,” the magistrate said. Annigoni? “That's the man. He made her look so Latin.”

    In 1978, the rumours were of a condominium. People suspected that London was about to sell them “down the river plate” and in Britain the pro-Falklands lobby grew. Three years later Ridley's leaseback plan was opposed in parliament. And so a cycle of action and reaction set off by the word “oil” ended with British diplomacy having nowhere to turn. Argentina began to sink drills in disputed waters. Britain's government took no more warlike a stance than placing adverts in the International Herald Tribune inviting oil companies to consider the “legal implications”. Argentina paid no attention, while Britain announced it was to remove its last regular patrol ship in the south Atlantic. In the words of Gustafson, by early 1982 Argentina had initiated a process of exploration “by which title to the Malvinas was beginning to flow back to it”.

    Only a few weeks later Argentina reversed this hopeful position by its disastrous decision to invade. Evicting its army cost 650 Argentinian and 258 British lives, but in Britain it remains the most popular of any war fought since 1945 – a legitimate correction of foreign aggression, a short campaign, a clear victory. What it wasn't was a solution. As Lawrence Freedman has written: “It is not the case that because the blood of British soldiers was spilled over the Falklands the islands must now remain British forever. If that was a firm rule then Britain would still be a substantial imperial power.” If enough oil is found, then sooner or later there will be talk once again of soft sovereignty.

    Feb 27th, 2010 - 08:10 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Expat Kelper

    182#lol, I think you should give credit to the author of your post which appears in today's Guardian.

    Feb 27th, 2010 - 01:29 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • patrick20210

    “The right to self-determination of the islanders – long the obstacle to any deal with Argentina – has to be qualified. Intransigent in their response to the Ridley negotiations and backed by neo-imperialist rightwingers in the House of Commons, the islanders demanded and got their rescue by the 1982 task force and extravagant support ever since. They have rebuffed all efforts by later Buenos Aires mediators to re-establish contact” <br />
    <br />
    Simon Jenkins<br />
    <br />
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/feb/25/falklands-britains-expensive-nuisance<br />

    Feb 27th, 2010 - 08:19 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Islander

    patrck20210 - please let me know where post 1982 did Argentina offer mediatioon talks - without havingf first made it clear in other statemenmts that the only possible acceptable outcome would be Arg sovereignty?
    What is always offerred to us from Argentina amounts to a dictarship - we will talk but you will end up doing what we say and want nothing else!
    And WHO walked out of international talks on oil co-operation etc in 2007?

    Feb 27th, 2010 - 10:43 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Tom Riddel

    HI guys, I figure this is just the beginning of something new, perharps should I say, we continue what we left undone in 1982.<br />
    You must recall on tohose things UK has done all over the world since it became an Empire.<br />
    <br />
    “And you dare to call me terrorist<br />
    while you look down your gun, <br />
    when I think of all the things <br />
    that you have done. <br />
    You have ploundered many nations,<br />
    divided many lands,<br />
    you have terrrorized their people,<br />
    you have ruled with iron hand, <br />
    and you brought this reign of terror to my land”<br />
    <br />
    “We're not english, we're not saxons, we're not brits<br />
    we are argentinians and proud we are to be <br />
    for fourhundred years we fought you without fear <br />
    and we'll fight you for fourhundred more.”<br />
    <br />
    “Go on home english soldiers go on home,<br />
    aint you have bloody homes of your own<br />
    so fuck the Union Jack we want our country back<br />
    and see Argentina together once more”. <br />
    <br />
    <br />
    <br />

    Feb 27th, 2010 - 10:50 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • David Barrow

    186 Tom Riddel (#)
    Feb 27th, 2010 - 10:50 pm

    HI guys, I figure this is just the beginning of something new, perharps should I say, we continue what we left undone in 1982.<br />
    You must recall on tohose things UK has done all over the world since it became an Empire.

    The Falkland Islands are no more responsible for what the UK did around the world than Argentina is responsible for what Spain did around the world. Whether Argentina shares any responsibility with Spain for what Spain did in the Viceroyalty is another question. After all Argentina is the beneficiary of what Spain did. And Argentina is definitely responsible for what Argentina did in Patagonia. (Note that I'm referring to state responsibilities and not any responsibilities citizens may have, they have none)

    “And you dare to call me terrorist<br />
    while you look down your gun, <br />
    when I think of all the things <br />
    that you have done. <br />

    A truly pathetic attempt to equate the Northern Ireland situation with the Falklands situation, The Irish do have some justification in their grievances against the British, the Argentines are victims only of themselves. And the Republic of Ireland has recognised Northern Ireland's right to self determination. Argentina could learn a lot from the Republic

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 03:43 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • lol

    Maria Strange shakes her head in anger and exasperation. Thirty seven years after she left her native Argentina and found a new life in the Falklands, she still cannot understand her countrymen's attitude to the islands and what she calls their “silly claim”.
    As the only Argentine citizen who remained on the islands throughout the 1982 invasion, she has had a unique perspective on the decades-long impasse that has pitched the country of her birth against the land she has adopted
    “The Argentines annoy me terribly and we really somehow need to educate them,” she said. “But it's going to take so long for them to understand that this is not a part of Argentina and it isn't a place full of people plonked here by the British government, which is what they like to believe.”
    Now 65, Mrs Strange spoke to The Sunday Telegraph to express her dismay as her native land once again went on the warpath, this time over a British oil company launching exploratory drilling in the disputed waters off the Falklands – which Argentina still claims as it own.
    Last week, Buenos Aires asked the United Nations to press Britain into fresh talks over the islands' future. The row, which followed Argentina's detention of a ship en route to the Port Stanley and threat of punitive measures against firms that do business there, seems all the odder to Mrs Strange because she remembers how little her countryfolk used to care about the islands.
    Even before the war, only a handful of Argentines lived there – as with Patagonia, they consider it too cold and windy, she said – and the few who reside there now are all married to islanders. Inevitably, they are a community content to stay below the social radar. Mrs Strange only knows of three others – two men who work for the local government, one of them a former fireman, and the wife of a local wealthy businessman.
    None has been there as long as her. Now 65, there is only a trace of foreign accent to her upper middle class English voice as she sits at her kitchen table in her Port Stanley house, a copy of The Guardian and a plate of chocolate Digestives in front of her.
    She has played down her Argentinian roots ever since she arrived on the islands in 1972 with her first husband, an Anglo-Argentine whose uncle owned a large Falklands estate. Growing up as Maria Villanueva in a Buenos Aires suburb, she had been heavily influenced by an uncle who had fought for the RAF during the Second World War and persuaded her parents to send her to a British-run school.
    “The Malvinas issue wasn't there then,” she said. “We were taught at school that there were these little pink dots on the map and, I suppose, that they really belonged to Argentina, but I didn't pay any attention. It meant nothing ... I don't think the people had been quite as brainwashed as they have since.”
    She found the Falklands in the early 70s “absolutely charming, like something out of a picture book on Scottish Highland villages”. The islands were then socially deeply divided and the snobbery of the so-called “sheepocracy” of rich farmers, with their cocktail parties at the Governor's House or the Colony Club, “has now happily faded away into something a little more democratic”, she said.
    She later got divorced and married Ian Strange, a British naturalist who runs a reserve on West Falkland, finding a job as a secretary for the Falklands government. Now retired, she spoke to The Sunday Telegraph to express her dismay as the Argentines once again went on the warpath, this time over a British oil company's drilling in dispute waters.
    Despite warnings on the local radio the previous night, “it was complete and total shock” when, then a young mother with a months-old daughter, she opened her door one morning in April 1982 to find the streets full of tanks and troops. “It was horrible – it was like a rape,” she said. “It's only much later that it has really sunk in.
    ”I thought I had found Utopia here. At the time, I could go back and visit my family in Argentina once a year, my child could easily have gone to school over there. It could have been the best of both worlds and then it was shattered by these stupid generals. I really resent that to this day.“
    For seven years after the war, she could only get to Argentina via Britain.
    The invasion, however, never alienated her from fellow islanders. She remembers a woman and noted ”Argie-hater“ who told her at a Government House dinner shortly after the war: ”You're all right, you're one of us now.“
    The reason was clear, she believes. ”I think it made a big difference that I stayed on during the war. If anybody ever had any doubts about my loyalties the fact that I didn't jump on the first plane back to Argentina – which I could have done – probably dispelled them.“
    Her ability to speak Spanish came in useful when she was able to ”fend off“ soldiers who came into the neighbourhood trying to rip up fencing for firewood. In general, she felt pity for the conscripts ”who had been sent to fight and really didn't have any idea what it was all about“ but only contempt for their commanders, who took over a house opposite. A ”nasty bunch“, when they fled they left booby-traps and a kitchen full of fresh food, even though their troops had been starving out on the hills.
    In contrast, a group of SAS men ended up sleeping on the Stranges' floor for a few days. One of them returned a year ago to see the old battlefields and stayed again.
    Mrs Strange has no sympathy at all with Argentina's claim to sovereignty over the Falklands, although she considers it ”a bit daft to be totally separate like we are now“.
    That said, even if some Argentines are being more realistic, they know it would be ”political suicide“ for them to give up their claim to Las Malvinas, she added. ”They're never going to do that so it's just this stalemate. It's just so boring. I really can't understand their thinking – the more they jump up and down, the less inclined people will be to take them seriously.
    “Domestically they're in chaos so it probably suits Mrs Kirchner to go around the Americas waving the flag. I would like to think that's all it is but maybe we thought that was all it was back in 1980 and then the intelligence got it all wrong and 'Bingo!'”
    She laughed at suggestions, voiced by some of her political leaders, that put it down simply to the Argentine's “hot Latin” temperament. “It goes beyond that. It's like a national obsession but it's a national obsession here, too,” she said. “Some people get voted on to the legislature because they wave the right flag.”
    She remains struck by the ignorance that Argentine visitors display about the Falklands when she helps takes them on guided tours. When they realise it is a democracy, that the government pays for people to go to university and that there is virtually no crime, they seem “slightly envious”. And she has become good friends with some of the relatives of Argentinian troops who died, because she translates for them on their visits to the war graves. “I know their stance, they don't ever voice it but obviously they've got people buried here and one day they must think the place will go over to Argentina. But they never say it,” she said. “They respect my position and I respect their unspoken views.
    ”But I still resent bunches of Argentines wandering around the streets and that's a fallout from the original shock. I don't mind going back to BA (Buenos Aires) but I'm much happier if they stay at home quite frankly.“
    Maria Strange detects some signs of change in Argentina over the Malvinas issue, finding educated young Argentines who are ”more open and simply curious about the Falklands“. But although she doubts it will come to war again, she is not convinced the Argentines will ”sit back“ as the islanders drill for oil and instead ”could continue being a nuisance”.
    Like other islanders, she is particularly worried that Argentina will put pressurise on LAN, the Chilean national airline (which now has strong interests in Argentina), to stop flying to the islands, leaving them with only the gruelling “air bridge” service to Britain as a means of flying to and from the Falklands.
    Even so, she is convinced the islands have a bright future. “In the 1970s you wouldn't have dreamt there'd be a thriving private sector and everybody on the legislative assembly would be locally elected. Confidence has grown enormously.
    ”We all moan about our government. But at least things do work and I can't imagine them doing that with Argentines in charge of everything. Heaven forbid! It really could just fall to bits.”

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 10:06 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Expat Kelper

    187#lol, I think you should give credit to the author of your post which appears in the Telegraph

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 10:12 am - Link - Report abuse 0
  • J.A. Roberts

    Lol, I agree with Expat Kelper and perhaps next time you can simply provide a link. It's a bit anti-social copying and pasting hectares of text.

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 12:44 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • lol

    J A Roberts I disagree. Please stick to the topic

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 02:13 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • johnny

    ja roberts not everyone likes to use links some prefer to read on site. Keep to the subject and stop being a pain by distracting

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 02:18 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • BALANCE

    It clearly states in lol 187 ......................“ Now 65, Mrs Strange spoke to The Sunday Telegraph to express her dismay ”
    No need to credit people or provide links which could be dead or revised

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 02:22 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • J.A. Roberts

    Oh yea Lol, the views of a 65-year-old woman regarding life in the Falklands are “on-topic” under a story about the hacking of a website? Speak for yourself! The thread went WAY off topic long ago...

    @Balance. Sure the piece quotes Mrs Strange, but it was written by Tom Leonard and Lol simply copied and pasted it without even so much as a nod in Tom's direction. Links go dead, but no overnight.

    I still think it's anti-social to copy and paste acres of text into a comments section or forum. It's supposed to be about making your point succinctly and providing links to back up. Not regurgitating hectares of stuff from other websites...

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 03:51 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • BALANCE

    toberts you are more stupid than I give you credit for

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 04:05 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • J.A. Roberts

    Shall we call that a draw then “balance”? You're not exactly displaying intelligence of Einsteinian proportions yourself...

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 06:17 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • lily

    dont you ever stop mr roberts???

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 06:55 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Alex

    Subject . Hacking of a website.<br />
    Somehow one could wish a lot of the comments written above had been hacked. often wrong subject. Further a use of dirty ugly four letter words.<br />
    Personal insultations. Aggression and hate etc.<br />
    However there are civilised comments (fromboth sides!)<br />
    Stefanie . I admire and respect your letter. Many of the other writers could learn.<br />

    Feb 28th, 2010 - 07:39 pm - Link - Report abuse 0
  • Amberscont

    Si los británicos se ponen duro con la Argentina, Argentina se pondrá duro con los británicos. Gran Bretaña necesita del continente Sudamericano, nosotros no los necesitamos a ellos.

    Aguante Argentina, Carajooo!!!
    Malvinas es un sentimiento......

    Mar 03rd, 2010 - 07:25 pm - Link - Report abuse 0

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