The United Kingdom on Sunday made several announcements following the departure of Lord Frost as chief negotiator of Brexit. The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Secretary is to become lead negotiator with the EU on the Northern Ireland Protocol.
Falklands had a most busy week in London with ministerial meetings, contacts, speeches, addressing an agenda full of issues in different fields most of them of interest for the Islands and shared with colleagues from the Association of Overseas Territories.
The curtain came down in Manchester on Wednesday, putting an end to the 2021 main English political parties conferences, with the Falkland Islands delegates and stand performing an excellent campaign, ahead of the Climate Change summit to be held in Glasgow hosted by London, and the coming events of next year when the Falklands will be “Looking Forward at 40”.
A delegation from the Falkland Islands is now installed in Manchester City attending the Conservative Party Conference21, which took off on Sunday 3 October and will extend until Wednesday 6 October.
The UK Government will supply the Overseas Territories with a proportionate share of the vaccines that the UK procures, and together with the UK Vaccine Taskforce are coordinating plans to deploy vaccines to the BOTs.
Argentina and the UK hosted a virtual seminar on access to vaccines in Latin America and the Caribbean addressing the portfolio of emerging vaccines against COVID-19, the challenge of equitable distribution and how best to tackle vaccine disinformation.
This week Penguin News gave up its editorial space to allow for the publication of a last-minute Op-ed from Wendy Morton MP, Minister responsible for the Falkland Islands in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, on the Joint Ministerial Council 2020
The annual Joint Ministerial Council (JMC) between the United Kingdom Government and the Governments of the Overseas Territories is taking place virtually this week with the involvement of lawmaker MLA Teslyn Barkman in representation of the Falkland Islands.
The Argentine government has criticized the successful eleven-year demining process in the Falkland Islands arguing it is a new “violation” of a UN resolution calling on both sides, UK and Argentina, to abstain from any unilateral action in the disputed territories.
The Falkland Islands have been cleared of deadly landmines laid during the 1982 conflict and will be celebrating the occasion with two major events on Saturday, November 14. The legacy of the war with the occupying Argentine forces had meant that large areas of the Islands, for 38 years, were previously off-limits.