Spanish Paramilitary continue their incursions in British Gibraltar Territorial Waters - despite FCO protests!

Spanish Paramilitary continue their incursions in British Gibraltar Territorial Waters - despite FCO protests!

Once again we have Spain beinf defiant and the FCO and UK government not helping us out! Instead they continue to send out the wrong messages!

How can it be acceptable behaviour from a neigbouring country who is in EU and in Nato to continue to bully and harass a smaller country only because they do not want to be SPANISH! The people of Gibraltar are the ones who choose their own future and yet UK shows no signs of waking up and defending us like they would for any incursions done in UK waters by say France!

What gives the UK the right to ignore and put us and our people in danger  our security at sea is put at risk as the Navy is turning a blind eye to protecting the integrity of our waters!

Below you have the information and the photo courtesy of Tommy Finlayson on the latest blatant incursions in our waters. Again I ask would you tolerate these incursions? Would you treat them as so called "innocent Passage"? I doubt that very much!

At 10.40 today 20 June 2013, not one but two Guardia Civil vessels at 150 metres off our moles. Rio Pas was navigating south at a very slow pace and Rio Cedena was travelling north and as can be seen Rio Cedena turned around and went alongside Rio Pas, both vessels coming to a complete halt. After approximately 3 minutes they both continued on the way.





 This incursion by two vessels was also captured on video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXficaDmupM&feature=youtu.be


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Spain seem set to try and stop our progress not only in the EU but now also in UEFA. They seem to find it difficult to accept us in anything we try to do or achieve!

REVEALED: Spain introduces sharp fees for friendly football, poised to affect Gibraltar

By Panorama
19.06.2013

In another move, said to be aimed at trying to stop Gibraltar's national team and clubs playing in Spain, the Spanish football federation have introduced sharp fees when at least a foreign team participates in matches or tournaments. It follows the cancellation at the weekend of a planned match between Cuba and Gibraltar.
Spanish press reports said the cancellation of the match, to have been played in Marbella, followed Spanish pressure. Cuban sources said it was 'truly strange'.
PANORAMA has now obtained a copy of a circular issued by the Spanish football federation about fees payable in friendly matches and tournaments.
Where at least a foreign national team plays, a fee of 9,000 euros per match is stipulated.
Furthermore, the Spanish say they can adopt other measures of an administrative, economic 'and in general any type of guarantee', with the view of 'protecting the interests of Spanish football.'
Since the new fees introduced should presumably also apply to others, apart from Gibraltar, it is being said that the Spanish are shooting themselves in the foot, as the ridiculous prices the Spanish federation are putting for playing friendlies, will most likely stop the number of foreign teams doing pre-season in Spain . It is said that already there are teams who are now changing country to play their pre-season matches.
The circular made available to us is dated last month.
Meanwhile, a Spanish press report yesterday said that the Gibraltar FA had wanted to have their new stadium ready for the 2016 Euro-Cup, with matches starting as early as next year, as this is not possible for Gibraltar, so 'home' matches would have to be played on foreign soil.
Until 2015 'the colony will not be able to play at home; Spain aims that that will be permanent,' said a Spanish headline, which shows the anti-Gibraltar feeling that evidently is being stirred up in certain circles in Spain.

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More info on the above - http://hereisthecity.com/2013/06/19/cf-gibraltar-and-spain-come-into-conflict-again/
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The new British ambassador to Spain Mr Simon Manley, sums up the FCO apathy towards our issues with Spain in three lines.

 https://www.gov.uk/government/news/change-of-her-majestys-ambassador-to-spain

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 This pic I think shows clearly what we feel. Courtesy Gareth Gingell

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Below is the latest letter sent to Simon Hughes Liberal MP

Dear Mr Hughes,

Firstly I would like to apologise for sending you this email, as I know the following subject is not your territory but desperate times call for desperate measures.

My name is Sheridan Borda, and I am from Gibraltar, I have had the pleasure of meeting you a few times in Gibraltar.

The reason for my emailing you is as follows:
In 1999 Gibraltar and Spain were at war with the fishing dispute, this was followed by the fishermen from Algeciras coming down to the frontier between La Linea de la Concepcion and Gibraltar and blocking it, only letting the spanish workers come into Gibraltar, other people from other nationalities where not allowed through, by the end of the afternoon the Gibraltarians had, had enough, and decided not to let any spanish workers through our frontier into Spain. After that day the previous administration GSD (Peter Caruana to be exact) who were then in office, met with the fishermen and signed an agreement with them, without consulting the people of Gibraltar, Gibraltar stuck to the agreement that was signed, but Spain being Spain never respected that agreement.

In the GSLP/Libs manifiesto of 2011 they said that if they got into office they would terminate that agreement, as you will be aware the GSLP/Libs were elected into office on the 8th Dec 2011, in March 2012 the GSLP/Lib terminated the agreement signed in 1999 between the fishermen and the previous administration and that is when the dispute started all over again.

For over a year now the fishermen have been coming into British Gibraltar Territorial Waters and when the Royal Gibraltar Police told them to leave our waters they left, only to come back, protected by the Guardia Civil, I would like to tell you Mr Hughes that the Guardia Civil (GC) are armed but our boys at the Royal Gibraltar Police (RGP) are not armed.

Now the Guardia Civil and Spanish Navy regularly keep coming in BGTW day in day out. The Royal Navy only gives them orders to leave, orders which like always fall on deaf ears, they completely ignore the Royal Navy's orders and they leave when they feel they have made a point. Please believe me when I say that the Guardia Civil are making a mockery of the Royal Navy, and all the Royal Navy can do is give orders, I understand that the Royal Navy's hands are tied, as they need orders from the Foreign Office, please forgive me for saying this but the foreign office are doing everything to placate Spain and not doing their job which it to protect is territories and their people.

As you are probably aware the Guardia Civil interfere with commercial and pleasure craft in BGTW, and have actually arrested couple of them and towed them into Algeciras.

Should this escalate any further we fear that a serious or fatal incident will occur. I have written to the MP William Hague and got a reply from Martin Wisdom saying that UK was monitoring the situation. I sent Mr Wisdom a number of emails and always had the same reply, "we are aware and we are monitoring the situation". I also sent an email to the PM David Cameron, I have received no reply from any one at number 10 not even to acknowledge my email, this was over a year ago, and still no reply.

I urge you Mr Hughes to please speak to Mr Hague or even to Nick Clegg as we desperately need UK to stand up to Spain once and for all.

I thank you for your time and I hope to hear from you in the not so distant future.

Yours sincerely

Sheridan Borda

 Local Representative for Defenders of Gibraltar

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So as you can see we need to up our stand further so that the whole world can hear about how Spain continues to bully Gibraltar. IN this day and age this behaviour should not be tolerated!

No country just because they are bigger should be allowed to discriminate or harass people who wish to choose their own nationality and future! We have to speak out and show the proof to the world! We need the issues we are facing to be known so that others can help us and also learn not to tolerate any form of bullying just because that country is bigger!

We have a VOICE, CHOICE and a right to be protected and to live peacefully and our security is of paramount importance!

UK has a duty to the people of Gibraltar and we are saying ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! No more appeasing to SPAIN and no more incursions by the SPANISH PARAMILITARY ARMED GUARDIA CIVILS IN OUR WATERS!

Anne-Marie Struggles