MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Timerman thanks Mujica on Falklands: “Uruguay has honoured its word”

The Argentine minister said the Falklands are “like a dagger in the heart of Latin America”

Argentine Foreign Affairs minister Hector Timerman publicly thanked and praised on Monday the Uruguayan decision, announced last week, to bar Falklands’ flagged vessels form the port of Montevideo and any other sea or fluvial terminal in the country.

“The Argentine government thanks Uruguay for the position adopted, Uruguay has honoured its word”, said Timerman during the meeting of the Mercosur council which brings together Foreign Affairs and Economy ministers from the block in anticipation of the Tuesday presidential summit.

Uruguayan president Jose Mujica and Foreign Affairs minister have consistently denied any Argentine pressure or influence on the decision to bar the Falklands’ flagged vessels.

“There is a political definition not to allow the docking in Uruguayan ports of vessels flying the Islas Malvinas flag, whose sovereignty is claimed by Argentina with the support from Uruguay” said the Uruguayan Executive portal ratifying Mujica’s earlier statements.

Timerman also requested the other members form Mercosur to bar access to their ports of Malvinas flagged vessels, which he described as an “illegal flag” in solidarity with Argentina’s claim over the Falklands which has been “under British dominance since 1833”

Addressing his peers Timerman described the “Malvinas occupied” Islands as a ‘colonial enclave’ which is “like a dagger in the heart of Latin America”.

“More than ever we must show the solidarity which we have always had”, said Timerman addressing his peers from Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela (which is in the process of full incorporation to Mercosur).

This is the first Argentine public reaction to the Uruguayan Navy intervention last Saturday to escort from the air a Spanish flagged vessel which left Montevideo and was heading for the South Atlantic with a Falklands’ government fishing licence and was harassed by an Argentine Coast guard unit.

“Villa Nores” which normally operates from Montevideo left River Plate shared waters and sailed in Uruguayan jurisdiction until reaching the high seas following on GC24 Mantilla demand that it surrender information and prepare for a boarding party.