Diplomacy rocks
By Jim
Brunsden
April 3, 2017
Financial Times / Brussels Briefing
We cannot know for certain what Alfonso Dastis, Spain’s
foreign minister, thought to himself on Sunday when he switched on the
television and saw that Michael Howard, a former British minister, was talking
about war to protect Gibraltar, but he might well have permitted himself a
smile.
The past few days have been a diplomatic masterclass from Madrid.
When it comes to the Gibraltar row, Spain secured a mention
of the territory in the EU’s draft Brexit negotiating guidelines that has
little legal relevance but that amounts to a political coup: it means other
capitals are being publicly respectful of Madrid’s sensitivities when it comes
to the British overseas territory.
In contrast to José Manuel García-Margallo, his combative
predecessor as Spain’s foreign minister, Mr Dastis, has shown a subtle touch
that is good at winning friends without requiring any ceding of precious
diplomatic ground.
That was fully on display last week, when he signalled a
softening of Madrid’s reservations about an independent Scotland joining the
EU.
Speaking to El País, Mr Dastis, a former Spanish ambassador
to the EU, said that “at first glance” he “did not foresee” any need to block a
Scottish application.
Pro-Union politicians in London, from Theresa May downwards,
have cited inevitable Spanish resistance as a crucial stumbling block for an
independent Scotland trying to join the EU. The argument wasn’t without merit:
Madrid was vocally against Scottish secession during the 2014 independence
referendum - a position linked to its concerns about any precedent that could
embolden separatists in Catalonia.
In his comments to El País, Mr Dastis sounded reasonable
without really giving anything away: Scotland could apply, but there’s no
guarantee what would come of the accession talks. Also, the holy grail for
Scottish nationalists has always been fast-tracked EU membership, not the
meagre right to start the process from square one.
Similarly, in the Gibraltar row, Madrid is the capital that
has come out looking reasonable; the bellicose language has been emanating from
London.
Madrid can bask in a diplomatic success, without having
demanded, or secured, any change in the situation on the ground. In fact, the
main people talking about a threat to British sovereignty are British and
Gibraltarian politicians and newspapers.
Mr Dastis, in his El País interview, could content himself
with acknowledging a new political reality:
“We have talked with our partners and the [EU] institutions
in recent weeks and we have made the Spanish position clear,” he said.
“When the United Kingdom leaves the EU, then the EU’s
partner is Spain, and that when it comes to Gibraltar the EU is obliged, as a
result, to take the side of Spain.”
Email: jim.brunsden@ft.com Twitter: @jimbrunsden
Brexit in the Med
Rock bottom Those looking for evidence that Gibraltar
occupies a special space in the British psyche need look no further than the,
in some quarters utterly bonkers, reactions to the reference to Gibraltar
included in the EU’s draft Brexit negotiating guidelines.
The offending sentence simply says that once Britain has
left the EU, no deal between the EU and the UK “may apply to the territory of
Gibraltar without the agreement between the Kingdom of Spain and the United
Kingdom”.
The statement has little, if any, legal meaning (see our
explainer here) but this hasn’t prevented British politicians reaching for a
sabre to rattle:
The tensions were laid bare when Michael Howard, former Tory
leader, recalled how Margaret Thatcher sent troops to the Falklands in 1982 “to
defend the freedom of another small group of British people against another
Spanish-speaking country”.
Lord Howard yesterday told Sky News he was “absolutely
certain” Mrs May would “show the same resolve in standing by the people of
Gibraltar”. Defence secretary Michael Fallon said Britain would go “all the
way” to defend its 300-year-old territory.
Gunboat diplomacy While war over a draft EU document
prepared by a centrist politician from Poland is not immediately on the cards,
that didn’t stop the Telegraph getting into the spirit of things:
Britain's Royal Navy is substantially weaker than it was
during the Falklands War but could still "cripple" Spain, military
experts have said.
Rear-Adml Chris Parry, a former director of operational
capability at the Ministry of Defence,
has called on the Government to "appropriately" invest in
Britain's military capacity if it wants to "talk big" over Gibraltar.
Brexit talks turn ugly over Gibraltar
By ANDREW RETTMAN
BRUSSELS, TODAY, 09:21
Britain has said Spain can have no new powers over
Gibraltar, as Brexit prompts hard talk on sovereignty, security, and borders.
“We will never enter into arrangements under which the
people of Gibraltar would pass under the sovereignty of another state against
their freely and democratically expressed wishes”, the British prime minister’s
office said in a statement on Sunday (2 April).
The British defence minister, foreign minister, and the
chief minister of Gibraltar issued similar comments in a debate prompted by the
start of Brexit talks last week.
“Gibraltar is going to be protected all the way,” Michael
Fallon, the defence chief, told the BBC on Sunday.
Boris Johnson, the foreign minister, said on Facebook: “The
UK remains implacable and rock-like in our support for Gibraltar.”
Fabian Picardo, the Gibraltar chief, told the BBC that life
under Spain would be “absolutely awful”. He told the Financial Times newspaper
that the UK should stand up to EU “bullies” and “blackmail”.
The Gibraltar issue came up after the EU published its draft
guidelines for Brexit talks last Friday.
The draft said “no agreement” on a future EU-UK trade deal
“may apply to the territory of Gibraltar without the agreement between the
Kingdom of Spain and the United Kingdom”.
The text indicates that Spain would have a veto over
Gibraltar’s economic future.
It might amount to little more than trying to force the
British outpost to change its super-low corporate tax rate.
Hard talk
But the rock, which Britain seized from Spain in 1704, has a
history of provoking tensions over status and territorial zones.
Michael Howard, a former leader of the ruling Conservative
Party in the UK, told the Sky News broadcaster on Sunday that Britain would go
to war with Spain over Gibraltar the same way it did with Argentina over the
Falkland Islands in 1983.
“Thirty-five years ago this week, another woman prime
minister sent a taskforce halfway across the world to defend the freedom of
another small group of British people against another Spanish-speaking country,
and I’m absolutely certain that our current prime minister will show the same
resolve in standing by the people of Gibraltar,” he said.
“I can see no harm in reminding them [the EU] what kind of
people we are,” he said.
British anti-EU tabloids, such as The Sun and The Express,
cited a former British military commander in saying the UK could crush the
Spanish navy.
The Brexit talks will also have to deal with thorny
questions on Scotland, Ireland, and security cooperation as well as trade and
freedom of movement for EU workers.
Scotland has said it wants to hold a second referendum on
independence in order to remain in the EU.
Irish politicians have said there should be a referendum on
Irish unification with Northern Ireland to prevent the reimposition of a hard
border after Brexit.
The UK, last week, also indicated it might hold back on
security cooperation with the EU if the trade talks go badly.
Scottish question
The Scottish question risks further enflaming tensions with
Spain after Madrid said at the weekend that it would not stand in the way of an
independent Scotland joining the EU.
Alfonso Dastis, the Spanish foreign minister, told the El
Pais newspaper on Saturday that he did “not foresee that we would block” Scottish
membership.
Spain had previously indicated it would block Scotland in
order not to create a precedent for separatists in the Spanish region of
Catalonia, but Dastis said the two cases were “not comparable” on
constitutional grounds.
Fallon, the British defence chief, indicated on Sunday that
the UK wanted to maintain security cooperation with Europe despite the nasty
rhetoric.
“What we’re now looking for is a deep and special
partnership which covers both economic and security cooperation,” he told the
BBC.
“We need to make sure that cooperation continues because
Europe faces threats not only from Russian aggression but, as we’ve seen in
recent weeks, from terrorism as well,” he said, referring to last month's
terrorist attack in London.
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