Spain harassing Gibraltar (again)

Morpheus77 · 27 Jul 2013 at 19:46

A few days ago the Gibraltar government created an artificial reef. These reefs are often made up of old ships which are stripped of contaminants and sunk intentionally, or of concrete blocks with holes and metal bars. This is an environmental measure which is aimed at giving corals something to grow on, provide refuge to fish, and more importantly prevent drag net fishing which is illegal and harmful to the seabed.

Spain has taken exception at this (even though they have created 50+ of exactly the same type of reef for the same reasons).

Their revenge is to slow down traffic at the border for all cars trying to leave Gibraltar, slowly checking each and every car. Waiting in the border queue can ordinarily take anywhere between 5 minutes to an hour at peak times. Right now, they are over 6 hours long, with cars causing gridlock as the tailback of traffic reaches all main roads in Gibraltar.

All kinds of people are spending these 6 hours in the heat of summer, including children and elderly, diabetic people becoming hypoglycemic, etc.

The irony is that the majority of people in the queue are Spanish. Up to 10,000 Spaniards cross into Gibraltar daily, because they work here. The government is doing this to hurt Gibraltar's tourist industry, but they don't even care about hurting their own people in the process.

The Gibraltar Government and voluntary people are giving water to people waiting in the queue and dealing with emergencies.

I think it's time the UK Government takes some action. Gibraltarians are British Citizens. Gibraltar is UK land.

Morpheus77 · 27 Jul 2013 at 19:56

Exactly. But we are used to that in Gibraltar. Basically the Spanish Government traditionally uses two things to distract the public. Sports success and conjuring up patriotism over Gibraltar.

The actual reef had to be laid with a Royal Navy ship and local Police boats protecting the tug boat that was doing the job from the Spanish paramilitary police boats who were intent on stopping the work.

They actually claim that Gibraltar has no territorial waters, because, get this, the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht where they gave Gibraltar to the UK in perpetuity did not mention territorial waters. But the very concept of territorial waters did not exist in 1713! The concept was made international law many years later, and ALL territories were given 3 or 12 miles (depending on what they wish to claim).

Gibraltar only claims 3 miles, and still they send fleets of fishermen into our waters daily, escorted by their Police, to force the issue to make the news and spin it into patriotic crap.

http://www.gibnet.com/fish/waters.gif

Morpheus77 · 27 Jul 2013 at 19:57

big_white_dog84 said:
As you say, most people affected are Spanish - so really they should be pressuring their own government.

Yes, and some are, but many others believe the spin. Also it hurts us to have such a problematic border. Tourists can be put off, and that is important to our economy. Plus try living in 3 square miles of land only being able to leave it by plane or ship. Gibraltarians also help the economy in the area because we do a lot of our shopping and leisure outings there. When things are smooth both Gibraltar and the surrounding towns in Spain are good for each others' economy. But politicians in Madrid obviously don't give a **** about the south of Spain.

Morpheus77 · 27 Jul 2013 at 20:02

It seems the ruling right wing party in Spain wants to emulate General Franco. He actually closed the border for 13 years. We were prisoners in our own land. Those years though strengthened our identity and resolve to never give in to Spain's claim over Gibraltar.

Morpheus77 · 30 Jul 2013 at 13:58

Thanks for your replies and support. Means a lot to Gibraltarians to have other Brits being supportive.

I'm glad the whole thing hit the news big time. Helps to show the Spanish Government for what it is. The pity is Spain is such a nice country, and full of great people, they just have a knack of getting themselves ruled by the worst.

Morpheus77 · 30 Jul 2013 at 14:20

Queues continue, but now they are changing strategy.

Instead of slowing down traffic leaving Gibraltar, they doing it on the way in.

I suppose they've realised the media coverage on our side was hurting them as it was easier for us to take photo and video evidence to send to international media, give water and medical attention to those affected, and have a word with tourists who don't know who is causing this.

Now the huge queue is in Spain, with some Gibraltarian cars stuck in increasingly hostile land, and with far less help or media around.

This sucks, it really does

Morpheus77 · 31 Jul 2013 at 07:22

It's getting uglier. Now they are stopping shipments of concrete into Gibraltar by land, so that's our construction industry in trouble. (Funnily enough one of the sectors that employs most Spaniards in Gibraltar).

Also, in some of the media coverage in the UK, the last article says border queues had stopped after Hague had complained to Spain...yes, for one day. Yesterday they were at it again, but coverage has dropped now, so many will be left thinking it's stopped after Hague intervened. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-23491339)

Morpheus77 · 31 Jul 2013 at 14:56

For some insight into why all this is happening. Spanish Minister Cañete (Agriculture and Fishing) also happened to be the Director of a company called Petrolífera Ducar S.L. He left it when he became a minister, leaving his brother in law in charge.

This company works in the bunkering business (delivering fuel to ships from another ship).

If he can control and manage Gibraltar's waters, he can control Petrolífera Ducar's main competitors.

He is basically using the fishermen as his troops.

Morpheus77 · 19 Aug 2013 at 08:35

Well, they turned up later than they said they would, hung around for just over an hour, waving Spanish flags and mooning the cameras, shouting 'Gibraltar Español' (kind of giving away what it's all about and its not exactly fishing).

Then they sailed back to their port, with the sight of Union Flags and Gibraltar flags all along the shore in Gibraltar as they were heckled.

I find all of it quite sad. We should be working out how to improve our economies and our environment to give our kids a better place to live in. This whole conflict will (and already is) be detrimental to the economies on both sides of the border.

Oh, and they also managed to attract seagulls to them which caused a bird strike on an incoming flight as they were demonstrating very close to the runway. Luckily the engine chewed it up quite happily and no major consequences, just a delay for outgoing flight.