Acting Permanent Under Secretary Matthew Rycroft summoned the Spanish Ambassador H.E. Federico Trillo on Tuesday afternoon to raise the United Kingdom’s serious concerns regarding a significant incursion into British Gibraltar Territorial Waters on 18 and 19 November.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague spoke on Wednesday to his Spanish peer Jose Garcia Margallo with the commitment of finding a diplomatic solution to the dispute at the Spain/Gibraltar border.
A Royal Navy warship used a routine logistical visit to Gibraltar on Wednesday to patrol British waters around the Rock. The highly unusual move came a day after an incursion by a Spanish Navy vessel and against the background of diplomatic tension between the UK and Spain over the waters row.
Gibraltar Chief Minister, Fabian Picardo held a meeting on Monday with UK Minister for Europe David Lidington in which they discussed their concerns over Spain’s purporting to pass legislation banning land reclamation and the offshore storage of fuel in Gibraltar waters.
British Government has lost a crucial appeal before the European Court of Justice [ECJ] relating to Gibraltar’s territorial waters. Britain was seeking to overturn an earlier judgement dismissing its legal challenge to the European Commission’s approval of a Spanish EU nature site in British waters.
UK has dismissed a comment by Spain’s Foreign Minister suggesting that Britain and Spain were poised to reach a bilateral solution to the fishing dispute. Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo said Spain was open to dialogue and that he and his British counterpart, William Hague, “talk a lot” about many issues, including Gibraltar
The Gibraltar Government has provided for more protection for British Gibraltar Territorial Waters with the publication of the revised Southern Waters of Gibraltar Management Scheme.
The European Commission has again urged Britain and Spain to cooperate on nature protection issues in Gibraltar waters, according to press reports in Spain. The reports cited anonymous Brussels officials saying the Commission had asked both countries to work to that end.
The UK reaffirmed sovereignty over Gibraltar and Gibraltar territorial waters following an incident with the Spanish Guardia Civil which detained two Gibraltar British Nationals in British jurisdiction and transferred them to Spain.
The Gibraltar government has told the UK that 'the time has now come for action, not simply written protests from London to Madrid' in defence of British Gibraltar Territorial Waters, following the latest incident where a Gibraltar vessel was boarded by the Guardia Civil in Gibraltar waters 'and forcibly conveyed' together with its occupants to Algeciras 'at high speed and without navigational lights.'