Prolescum
New Member
[url=http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&eotf=1&u=http://www.cancilleria.gov.ar/es/la-cuestion-de-las-islas-malvinas&act=url said:The Argentine Government - Translation by Google[/url]"]
The Question of the Falkland Islands has been described by the UN as a special and particular colonial case involving a dispute between Argentina and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland should be settled through negotiations between the two parties.
Similarly has ruled the Organization of American States.
Argentina also has the strong support of the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean to the legitimate rights of sovereignty over the Malvinas Islands, South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands and the surrounding maritime areas, as well as solidarity with other countries regions that support the resumption of negotiations between the two parties to reach a peaceful and definitive solution to the dispute.
The Argentine government seeks to recover the islands by peaceful means, in accordance with the principles of international law and taking into account the interests of its inhabitants.
However, despite the continued willingness of the Argentine government dialogue, the UK ignored the call of the international community to resume negotiations on sovereignty and aggravates the situation by conducting unilateral activities, which include exploration and exploitation renewable resources and non-renewable, and the military exercises.
[url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/mar/12/falkland-islands-referendum-votes-yes said:The Grauniad on the Falkand Islanders' referendum[/url]"]
Despite near zero temperatures and flurries of snow and rain, the turnout was 92% from an electorate of 1,650.
All but three people voted yes to the question posed on the ballots: "Do you wish the Falkland Islands to retain their current political status as an overseas territory of the United Kingdom?"
Being British, one could say I have a horse in this race, so I will state outright that I don't give a toss about who owns what. Borders just reinforce the us VS them mentality and fear of the other.
What does concern me in this topic is what Argentina says above, in particular, this:
The Argentine government seeks to recover the islands by peaceful means, in accordance with the principles of international law and taking into account the interests of its inhabitants.
Talking about the result, Argentinian Senator Daniel Filmus said this:
Senator Daniel Filmus said:We must denounce this trickery that pretends to represent the popular participation of an implanted population
and
This publicity stunt has no validity for international law.
I believe the "international law" he's talking about is the UN's statement that the two nations (the UK and Argentina) should enter negotiations on sovereignty. The "trickery" being that because the population isn't native, it has no right to self-determination.
With respect, I believe, to that position, Senator Anibal Fernandez has since said:
Senator Anibal Fernandez said:There will never be self-determination for an implanted population and there is no legal framework for this, the Malvinas are Argentine sovereign soil
Apart from a brief period in 1982 when Argentina invaded and occupied the islands, it has been home to British citizens (dependents) for nearly two hundred years, and while I agree that Britain's old colonies should be returned to native populations (like Diego Garcia, currently rented to the U.S. as a military base - utterly disgraceful in my view), these islands never had a native population. As far as I'm aware, it had changed hands several times before 1833 when it became a British dependency for the final time.
The British position, as I understand it, is that any negotiation that takes place must include representatives from the inhabitants, to which Argentina has refused, giving the same reasoning as Senator Anibal Fernandez, namely that the population is implanted, has no right to self-determination and therefore should not be represented at the discussion.
To me, it looks like this The Argentine government seeks to recover the islands by peaceful means, in accordance with the principles of international law and taking into account the interests of its inhabitants is entirely bunk, seeing as they've tried to invade the islands already and will be ignoring the views of the referendum held on the 10th of March (as noted, they won't even allow the inhabitants to join negotiations due, according to Argentina, to the UN's resolution which states that the UK and Argentine governments enter negotiations - it doesn't mention third parties).
Of course, this is all ignoring the implanted (Portugese or Spanish - can't remember) population of Argentina.
So my question to you is... although the above is only scraping the top of the issue, I cannot see a legitimate case for the Falkland Islands to cede sovereignty to Argentina, can you point it out to me?