UK’s new deal with Europe excluded the Falklands

The UK-EU Free Trade Agreement in the hours leading up to the last Christmas Eve is a blow to Falklands islanders, and good news for Argentina as it leaves it in good condition. rethink your strategy to claim sovereignty held since 1833.

It happens that this last part of the Brexit agreement, which will govern from next Friday, January 1, the so-called overseas territories that Britain still owns have been excluded: among them the islands of the South Atlantic, disputed by Argentina.

By excluding the Falklands from what had been agreed between London and Brussels in commercial matters, the products of the islands they will no longer benefit from the privileges they had when the United Kingdom was part of the European common market. From now on, they will pay tariffs and, in any case, they will depend on the new agreements that the British will conclude for them before Brussels, which remains in charge of their external relations and their defense.

“The non-integration of the Malvinas Islands into the Brexit deal was one of the issues raised by Foreign Minister Felipe Solá in talks with Josep Borrell (EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and security policy) and with all European foreign ministers. with whom he spoke this year and with whom he raised Argentina’s position regarding the validity of UN resolution 2065 and the existence of a controversy regarding the exercise of sovereignty, which according to our rights and our constitution correspond in Argentina, “said on Saturday to Clarín Daniel Filmus, secretary of the Falklands and South Atlantic Islands region of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “The EU’s decision not to include the Falklands, South Georgia and the South Sandwich respects this view”he added.

Since, by a slight majority, the British decided in a referendum to separate from the European Union (2016), kelp fish began to prepare for a possible loss of access to their products (mainly fish and second-measure sheepmeat) to the European market with zero tariff. This claim to Prime Minister Boris Johnson was now accentuated while an unfavorable negotiation was planned. In fact, they were not the most important part for the British in their interests before Brussels.

By the way, in the busiest hours of the end of this latest trade deal which was struck on Wednesday 24, Prime Minister Johnson anticipated it. It was at the end of the year that he sent a message to the islands.

“The EU was absolutely uncompromising when it comes to excluding most of our overseas territories from this year’s trade negotiations. But he was not forgotten or left behind. We will work with Governor Phillips and his MALs to support them through the change. And in the longer term, our independent trade policy will open the door to all kinds of new markets for Falklands exports, so that in the months and years to come the world will if not its oyster, certainly its squid ”, a- he said. to the featured resource that supports the Falklands’ public treasury.

Income from the granting of fishing licenses to foreign vessels constitutes between 50% and 60% of the islands tax revenues. And from January 1, the islands are about to pass zero tariff to pay between 6 and 18 percent for the products they bring to Europe, although London will also seek to negotiate it.

The text letter of the deal reached Wednesday 24 reads as follows:

In the seventh part of the final provisions, an article on “territorial scope” states: “1- This Agreement applies: to the territories to which the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union and the Treaty establishing the European Atomic Energy Community are applicable, and in conditions established in the said treaties, and b: Territory of the United Kingdom “.

After referring to point 3 in Gibraltar and other cases, he said in point 4: “This agreement does not apply to overseas territories which have special relations with the United Kingdom: Anguilla, Bermuda, British Antarctic Territory, British Indian Ocean Territory, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Falkland Islands, Montserrat, Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie and Oeno, Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha Islands, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands and Turks and Caicos Islands “