Spain’s Continuing Claim To Gibraltar

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32324, 16 June 1970, Page 20

Spain’s Continuing Claim To Gibraltar

At first glimpse, Gibraltar is just a piece of rock basking in the sun, with tourists and I monkeys—in any order you like climbing al) over it.

But scratch the Rock and you will End age-old hatreds and baraMtnents that have gone on for a decade or more, as Britain and Spain dispute ownership and sovereignty. Although Spain has eased the pressure somewhat in her recent apparent effort to come to friendlier terms with the rest of the Western world, she has by ho meads given up her claims to the territory which, although it is one of the last British colonies, is still geographically a part of Spain. The dispute has been continuing, on and off, since Gibraltar was won for Britain in 1704. during the War of the Spanish Succession, by a combined Dutch and English force uner Sir George Rooke, and was ceded to Great Britain by the Treaty of Utrecht, it has always been a naval base of vital strategic importance, and even in this nuclear age it is an important outpost of Britain |n tjte event of war. Great Siege There have been several attempts to retake the Rock, the most famous being the great siege in 1779-1783 when it was held for three years and seven months against a combined French and Spanish force. But the attempt to regain Gibraltar which was started with a new vengeance in 1884 has continued almost uninterrupted to this day. Less than 10 years after i the war, Spain claimed that she had been promised Gibraltar by Britain after the war on the condition that she remain neutral during World War IL Thia claim was dismissed in characteristically strong terms by the then Prime Minister, Sir Winston Churchill. But since then, a continued programme of harassment has been undertaken by Spain in an effort to bring the citizens of Gibraltar to heel. Spanish workers, wbo have .been a traditional source of labour In the tourist industry, have been refused permits to enter Gibraltar, ex-

cept for a select few who have special passes which enable them to travel to the Rock daily by the Algeciras ferry. in June last year, the Algeciras ferry was stopped altogether, and the workers wbo had been entering Gibraltar daily to work were given weekly compensation by the Spanish Government for their loss of income; the running of the ferry had been erratic for some time previously and it was a common eight to see a hundred or so tourists refused passage when they had a plane to catch in Gibraltar on their way home from » Spanish holiday.

Frontier Searches) schoolchildren had also' been inconvenienced by the ferry, which they had to catch before 6 a.m. every morning to got to school in Spain, and there would not be another for them to catch until after 8 a.m. The Spanish customs officers also subjected tourists end travellers for stringent searches on the frontier and anything except fruit and vegetables was a forbidden import into Spain. In IM7 the Gibraltarians were asked in a referendum to give their opinions on Joining Spain, tn an overwhelming majority—l2,l3B for Britain, 44 for Spain—the people of the Rock made known their attitude to the Fascist regime next door. Yet throe months inter the United Nations, against the wishes of the people thenv selves and in an apparent contradiction of everything it has ever claimed to stand for, asked Britain to get out of Gibraltar by October 1, 1060. But as the deadline came and Went, the only signs of any change were a dozen or so British naval vessels in the area, racing a rusty line of: tatty Spanish ships. Quarrel Revived On {the following day Franco cut the telephone links to Gibraltar, but calls on direct lines Across Spain to the rest of Europe were not interrupted. In November there was a Cabinet reshuffle in Madrid and a warmer atmosphere permeated Spanish-British relationships Indeed. Franco gave the residents of the Rock a Christmas present when he restored telephone services between Spain and the Rock for 36 hours during the holiday. But early this year the quarrel was revived when in February the Royal Navy I held exercises in the Western Mediterranean, although Spain bad been advised of this some time previously and had then put forward no Objections. And so the dispute continues. As late as : March 16 this year, the Minister of Industry. Mr Jose Maria Lopez de Letona, asserted that rt was still the intention of his Government to "restore the territorial I integrity of Spain by incorporating into our sovereignty

the Rock which was seized from us by force.” It is anybody’s guess how much longer the British Bulldog oan stand astride the Rock—one of the last remaining pebbles of an Empire. Copyright P.A. Features.