Argies vow to get Falkands back

April 3, 2007 General 4 comments
! This post hasn't been updated in over a year. A lot can change in a year including my opinion and the amount of naughty words I use. There's a good chance that there's something in what's written below that someone will find objectionable. That's fine, if I tried to please everybody all of the time then I'd be a Lib Dem (remember them?) and I'm certainly not one of those. The point is, I'm not the kind of person to try and alter history in case I said something in the past that someone can use against me in the future but just remember that the person I was then isn't the person I am now nor the person I'll be in a year's time.

The Vice-President of Argentina has marked the 25th anniversary of his country’s invasion of the Falkland Islands with a speech claiming sovereignty over the islands and calling on the UK to enter talks through the United Nations on handing the islands over Argentina.

The British government has previously said that is the 2,900 adults on the Falklands ask them to then they will enter into discussions but the last referendum held there rejected the idea that their sovereignty should be discussed with the Argentines.

During the main ceremony in Argentina, one “member of the public” planted an Argentinian flag in a mound of dirt with the Falklands drawn on it and the words “We will be back”.  Argentina has said that it won’t resort to force again to get the islands back.

The situation in the Falklands is similar to that of Gibraltar where the territory has been occupied by the UK for hundreds of years but is claimed by its largest and closest neighbour.  In both cases the locals have rejected sovereignty talks through referenda.

4 comments

  1. Keith Simmonds (6 comments) says:
    April 3, 2007 at 5:08 pm

    Would we be upset if the Spaniards/Argentinians were sat on the Isle of Wight?
    Nah! Of course not!

    Reply
  2. wonkotsane (1133 comments) says:
    April 3, 2007 at 7:36 pm

    Possibly but it depends on whether the Spaniards/Argentinians claimed and colonised the Isle of Wight before we did.

    Reply
  3. Keith Simmonds (6 comments) says:
    April 4, 2007 at 12:35 pm

    Like they had the Falklands? See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falkland_Islands
    esp. “The United Kingdom took control of the islands by force with the 1833 invasion of the Falkland Islands following the destruction of the Argentine settlement at Puerto Soledad by the American sloop USS Lexington (December 28, 1831). Argentina has continued to claim sovereignty over the islands, “

    Reply
  4. wonkotsane (1133 comments) says:
    April 4, 2007 at 1:10 pm

    And if you read the FCO’s history of the Falklands it gives a different story.

    The first known landing was made in 1690 by a British naval captain, John Strong. He named the Islands after Viscount Falkland, First Lord of the Admiralty at the time.

    First landing was by the British navy.

    In 1764, a small French colony, Port Louis, was established on East Falkland. Three years later this was handed over to Spain on payment of £24,000. The Spanish renamed the settlement Puerto de la Soledad.

    The islands weren’t claimed by any country at this point.

    A British expedition reached West Falkland in 1765, and anchored in a harbour which it named Port Egmont. It took formal possession of it and of ‘all the neighbouring islands’ for King George III.

    First country to claim possession was Britain.

    In the following year, another British expedition established a settlement of about 100 people at Port Egmont. This settlement was withdrawn on economic grounds in 1774, but British sovereignty was never relinquished or abandoned.

    Still claiming sovereignty.

    Argentina’s claim to the Falklands is based on the grounds that, at the time of British repossession of the Islands in 1833, Argentina had sovereignty over them through her inheritance, upon independence, of Spain’s possessory title (uti possedetis), through her attempts to settle the Islands between 1826 and 1833, and through the concept of territorial contiguity. However, uti possedetis is not accepted as a general principle of international law. Moreover Spain’s title to the Islands was disputed and in 1811 the Spanish settlement was evacuated.

    Argentina’s official claim to the islands even if they were unoccupied is tenuous at the very best and has no basis in international law.

    The Wikipedia article you refer to has been in dispute since 2004.

    Reply

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