MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Struggling to preserve Falklands’ self-determination in the South Atlantic

MLAs Dick Sawle and Roger Edwards: A message to America

(*) By Roger Edwards and Dick Sawle
Visiting the United States, with its bustling streets in Washington and Manhattan, is always a bit of a culture shock for a Falkland Islander. While we have much in common – a shared ancestry and language, and the democratic values that underpin our societies – we have a few differences too.

With just over 3,000 inhabitants, our island is smaller than Connecticut, with a population less numerous than the staff of Georgetown University. You have skyscrapers on your streets; we have the occasional sea lion. It is always going to be a tale of contrasts when one of the world’s smallest democracies comes to call on the world’s most powerful one.

Many Americans will not know who we are; that is understandable. We live over 5,500 miles away, at the very southern tip of the Americas. Those who have heard of the Falkland Islands are most likely to know us from nearly 30 years ago, when Argentine forces invaded our country. We were saved by the heroic efforts of Britain’s armed forces, and remain grateful for their sacrifices. But we also continue to thank the U.S., for its discreet but vital support to restore our liberties.

We are in Washington this week to warn that, while the military threat from Argentina has receded, Buenos Aires is not letting us live in peace. They now work to gain our country through other means: illegal economic pressure and the propagation of a myth to delegitimize the rights of the Falkland Islands people.

Argentina has introduced a raft of economic sanctions which aim to isolate and harm us, put a stranglehold over legitimate trade and commerce in the South Atlantic that damages the interests of any country, including the US, whose businesses seek legitimate opportunities there. Buenos Aires has threatened sanctions against anyone with a license to fish in Falklands territorial waters; its legislation penalises companies involved in our oil and gas exploration; it prevents charter aircraft flying from our neighbours to the islands; and it illegally demands that any vessel travelling to or from the Falkland Islands through the International Strait of Magellan obtains authorisation from the Argentine authorities.

The result is a de facto blockade of our country to impede our economic development. To those who believe in the free exchange of goods and services, this is unacceptable. America has fought wars to protect such important principles.

Simultaneously, Argentina propagates a pernicious myth about our history to strip us of our democratic rights. They claim that the Falklands were seized by the British in the 1830s, that the Argentine population was expelled, and that the current inhabitants are temporary British implants. The truth is that the uninhabited Islands were claimed by Britain in 1765, before Argentina ever existed. No civilian population was ever expelled. And we, the descendents of those first inhabitants (joined later by immigrants from Europe, South America and Asia) have inhabited the Falklands for nearly 180 years. Indeed, some of us can trace our ancestry back to nine generations of Islanders.

We understand why some institutions, like the Organization of American States this month, advocate a peaceful “resolution” of the “dispute” between Britain and Argentina.

But this is not about Argentina or even Britain. It is about the Falkland Islands, and our democratic rights.

We are not a colony. We are a vibrant country, with an elected government and the constitutional right to choose how we govern our own affairs. Abraham Lincoln’s government ‘of the people, by the people’, resonates as loudly in the Falklands today as it did in the U.S. almost 150 years ago. This cannot be dismissed or disregarded for others’ territorial aggrandizement or political expediency.

Our country is indeed small. We are but a few thousand people resisting the pressure from a nation of forty million. But we will not be cowed.

We are self-sufficient, resourceful and determined to protect our freedoms – not unlike those men and women who founded the United States as a beacon of liberty. Argentina’s attempts to punish and persecute us represent the worst kind of 19th Century colonial arrogance that they supposedly condemn. It is an anachronism in the 21st Century, and is deserves wholesale condemnation from all who value democracy. (The Hill – Congress Blog)
 

(*) The Hon. Roger Edwards and the Hon. Dick Sawle are members of the Falkland Islands Legislative Assembly.