The UN Decolonisation Committee has not received any further requests on the Falklands/Malvinas issue, and “there is no such procedure as self-determination regarding the Islands dispute”, according to the C24 president Diego Morejón Pazmiño, standing Ecuadorean ambassador before the UN.
Argentine president Cristina Fernandez again called on the UK to hold talks over the sovereignty of the Falklands/Malvinas Islands during her address to Congress on Friday when she delivered the ‘State of the Nation’ speech and formally opened the 131st legislative sessions.
Interest in the Falkland Islands’ dispute with Argentina, assimilated to the current Senkakus/Diayous islands situation in Asia apparently has not been limited to the quotes made by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe before the Japanese Parliament but also in another minor experience precisely in the Falklands and involving the Editor of the Penguin News, the local weekly newspaper of the Islands.
Africa’s fifty four countries joined South America “in recognizing the legitimate sovereignty rights of Argentina over the Malvinas, South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands and the adjoining maritime spaces”, announced the Argentine Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a communiqué in reference to the so called Declaration of Malabo, capital of Equatorial Guinea.
By Fernando Petrella (*) - The following article by an Argentine former Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs was published as a column in the Buenos Aires media. The following reproduction in English is not necessarily literal but tries keep to its spirit as much as possible.
By Peter Pepper - Private conferences have long been used by pressure groups to get something they want onto the public agenda. The so-called Argentine-British Conferences were like this. They were an Argentine idea, and the so-called 'British' delegations were largely controlled by, and packed with, Falklands’ opponents in Britain. They achieved the nickname the Argentine Biased Conferences or the Anti-British Conferences. But they failed in their objective and faded away.
This Friday the Malvinas Forum, chapter Uruguay will be celebrating its first anniversary and is expected to announce a statement strongly rejecting the coming referendum in the Falklands on the Islands political status which is scheduled for March 10/11. The meeting will be held in Maldonado where it was originally launched.
Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman said on Thursday that the British government’s position on the Falklands/Malvinas Islands issue “smells too much like petroleum”, revealing that UK’s biggest interest in keeping the invaded archipelago is due to the potential oil findings.
An Argentine columnist has found two great virtues: audacity and tolerance in Foreign Minister Hector Timerman current incursion in London to lobby and argue in favour of the most intransigent of Argentina’s position on the Falklands’ dispute.
There is no such thing as Falkland Islanders, the Argentine Foreign minister Hector Timerman insisted during a press conference in London on Wednesday, claiming they are British citizens living in disputed islands. He claimed the United Nations only acknowledges two parties in the territorial dispute: UK and Argentina.