Gibraltar: Spain prods resistant rock on co-sovereignty

By Alyssa McMurtry

MADRID (AA) – Gibraltar has rejected Spain’s latest overtures towards joint sovereignty, but like a persistent suitor, Madrid keeps pushing.

Jose Garcia-Margallo, Spain’s acting foreign minister, told Spanish TV that he expects joint sovereignty negotiations between Spain and Britain over Gibraltar to begin next spring.

“By March they’ll begin to realize that the world isn’t going to be the same when Britain leaves the European Union,” said Margallo in an interview Wednesday night.

He added, "Now we need to begin the labor of seduction -- to convince the Gibraltarians that they'll be better off with Spain."

On Tuesday at the United Nations, Spain formally presented a proposal to Britain for joint sovereignty over Gibraltar. The plan would bring the rocky British territory at the southernmost tip of the Iberian Peninsula, with a population of around 32,000, under the control of both Spain and Britain.

A similar plan was rejected by nearly 99 percent of Gibraltarians in a 2002 referendum.

“It is simple: No way, Jose! You will never get your hands on our rock. Never,” Fabian Picardo, chief minister of Gibraltar, told a UN committee meeting in response to Spain’s proposal Tuesday.

When asked what he thought of Picardo’s statement, Margallo responded: “No, not my hands, but I’ll be putting the flag on the rock sooner than Picardo imagines.”

Margallo said the plan will be a “win-win” for all parties. In the Brexit referendum, 96 percent of Gibraltarians voted to remain in the European Union.

“There will be two options: the people of Gibraltar will be British and out of the European Union, or they will be Spanish and British and they can stay in, and maintain all the advantages,” he said.

- The ‘big kids’

On Wednesday, Peter Wilson, a UK representative at the UN, said Britain will not enter any negotiations that Gibraltar does not like.

Margallo said he understands that position, but according to international law, he said Britain and Spain do not have to formally consult Gibraltar over the question of sovereignty.

“Here, only the big kids play,” he said.

Margallo also announced that he would submit a proposal to Brussels next week, presumably to convince the EU that this is a bilateral issue, and has scheduled a meeting with the regional leader of Andalucía, a Spanish region that borders Gibraltar, to discuss Gibraltar’s future.

Analysts say that Spain is hoping to use the Gibraltar issue as a bargaining chip during bilateral negotiations with Britain. Earlier this week Margallo also announced plans to make the UK pay for the healthcare of the estimated 800,000 British people who live in Spain.