Tri-Service

Spain Slammed Over Gibraltar Incursions

It's emerged that there were 434 incursions by Spanish vessels into British territorial waters around Gibraltar in the past year.

The figures, recorded in the 12 months to the end of October, represent a 7% increase on the previous year, at an average of over one incident a day.

A Gibraltar Government spokesperson told Forces TV:

"Spain refuses to recognise the existence of British Gibraltar Territorial Waters, and maintains the absurd proposition that the waters around the Rock are Spanish."

"They therefore behave in accordance with that mistaken notion and this is why the Spanish Navy and other agencies of the Spanish state carry out these incursions. Spain is making a sovereignty point which is contrary to international law.

"The United Kingdom and Gibraltar maintain that the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) grants Gibraltar territorial waters of a minimum of three miles and up to the median line in the Bay of Gibraltar.

"The United Kingdom is free to claim 12 miles of territorial sea for Gibraltar under the convention but has not yet done so. There needs to be robust political and diplomatic action to stop these illegal incursions.

"Clearly whatever action has been taken up to now has not worked. There is also an argument to be made for larger vessels for the Royal Navy in order to deter such incursions."

"Spain should stop this dangerous behaviour before there is an accident and somebody gets hurt. Moreover, the Spanish actions are a distraction from more important security issues which surround the straits."

Spain, however, doesn't recognise Gibraltar's territorial waters and airspace as being part of the United Kingdom.

It argues that due to the wording of the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht, which ceded the territory to Britain, the actions by its vessels do not represent incursions. A statement on its foreign ministry's website reads:

"Only the city and the castle of Gibraltar are ceded along with its port, fenders and fortresses that belong to it; Spain did not relinquish the isthmus, the territorial waters or the... airspace."

It comes in the same week the Royal Navy fired flares at a Spanish research vessel after it strayed into British Gibraltar territorial waters.