The agreement between Spain and the United Kingdom on Gibraltar is “very close,” the Foreign Minister, José Manuel Albares, said this Tuesday, after meeting in Brussels with his new British counterpart, an old acquaintance in fact, former Prime Minister David Cameron. , back in the community capital to participate in a NATO meeting. “There has been progress,” he stressed.
The Spanish delegation did not miss the paradox that the man who called the referendum on the United Kingdom's membership in the European Union thinking he could win it, the maker of Brexit, is now in charge of closing the last big issue. pending his country's decision to leave the club. The Government maintains that the only thing missing is “political will” to close the agreement and sees the availability of Cameron, who spoke by phone with Albares on Monday and they arranged to meet the next day in Brussels, as a good omen. “There has been no tension, no dispute,” the Spanish minister assured the press after the meeting, which the British Government had not reported on on Tuesday night.
On New Year's Eve 2020, Spain and the United Kingdom closed an in extremis pact to avoid border controls that included basic concepts to develop the new framework of relations, but since then the agreement has been impossible. Albares celebrated that, for now, the meeting has allowed the reactivation of bilateral negotiations, which had been paralyzed for several months. Both governments have given instructions to their respective negotiating teams to seek the appropriate “legal formulas” to implement the global agreement proposed by Spain as an alternative to the application of Brexit in the Rock. That is, a fence that would severely damage the economy of the entire region. For Albares, the document presented by Spain is “the best way to consolidate the current area of shared prosperity.”
One of the topics addressed by Albares and Cameron was the common use of Gibraltar airport, a place where the concept of sovereignty comes into play in a very practical way. This part of the Spanish proposal continues to pose problems for London, which this summer called it “unacceptable” that Spain intended to apply its own rules and standards. On the other hand, the modalities of border control itself are no longer the subject of discussion, according to official sources. “Now we have to let the technical teams work,” but “what David Cameron has conveyed to me is the same will that I have to reach an agreement,” said Albares.
The alternative to a bilateral agreement between Spain and the United Kingdom, which will later be endorsed by the European Commission, would be the pure and simple application of Brexit in the Rock, a change that would leave it in a “much worse” situation, the Government maintains. . Although after so many delays and setbacks (almost a year ago Madrid sent its agreement proposal to London) the Spanish Government does not consider a specific deadline to reach an agreement, the holding of elections to the European Parliament in June 2024 and the The resulting renewal of the community executive presents a natural time horizon.
“We have been talking about the proposal that Spain has put on the table for more than enough time. The agreement should not be delayed any further. The current situation is a temporary situation, that is how it is intended. The normal situation should be the new agreement or, if not, the application of European legislation,” she stressed.
