Falkland Islanders have been praised for their international campaign of diplomacy explaining their democratic credentials to the world and proclaiming their overwhelming referendum vote for self-determination and retaining their links with the United Kingdom.
In a statement released Friday afternoon, the Falkland Islands Government has said it was saddened to learn of the passing of former South African President Nelson Mandela yesterday.
The Falkland Islands will commemorate on Sunday the naval engagement of 8th December 1914 when the Royal Navy sunk with a minimum loss of life the German fleet, an event which until Liberation Day, 14 June 1982, was the most outstanding of the Islands calendar.
The European Commission announced on Thursday that the Falkland Islands has been allocated a sum of 5.9million Euros to support economic development activities between 2014 and 2020. The announcement of the new allocation under the European Development Fund was made at the 12th Annual OCT-EU Forum being held in Brussels this week.
“Unthinkable, unacceptable and unsupportable” was how Joanisval Brito Goncalves, Senior Legilslative Counselor for International Affairs and Defence Issues at the Brazilian Senate, described the Argentine government’s attitude to the Falkland/ Malvinas Islands in a press conference held in Stanley on Wednesday afternoon.
A delegation of political advisors from the Brazilian Congress is currently in the Falkland Islands. The group is accompanied by Andrew Ford First Secretary FCO Brasilia.
A book by John Fowler on what it was like to live through the Falkland Islands 1982 war from an Islander’s view has been made available in Argentina Translated from its British version ‘1982 and all that’ which has been available on Amazon for Kindle for some time, ‘1982: Difficult Days in the Falklands’ is soon to be available in Spanish thanks to the publishing house Winograd.
Argentina thanked Commonwealth member Guyana for its strong support in the Malvinas Islands question and underlined the excellent bilateral relations in all fields, during the official visit of Foreign minister Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett to Buenos Aires.
Panama Foreign minister Fernando Núñez Fábrega underlined his country's traditional and committed support for Argentina's sovereignty claims over the Malvinas and other South Atlantic Islands and their adjoining maritime spaces, an issue that was discussed during this week's visit to Buenos Aires, a special guest of his peer Hector Timerman.
The Falkland Islands government said on Friday that Argentina's latest illegal attempt to undermine the Islands economy is in direct contradiction with its alleged claim that it wants to establish a dialogue and is yet another effort to disrupt the lives of 3.000 people who want to live in peace and with good neighborly relations.