Charlie Smith
THE UK has rejected EU legislation that supports Spain’s claims over Gibraltar airport.
Spain says it owns the land on which the airport is built.
But EU no-deal Brexit legislation says it is ‘without prejudice’ to the ‘position of the Kingdom of Spain with regard to the sovereignty over the territory in which the airport of Gibraltar is situated’.
Direct UK-EU flights will continue for nine months in the event of a no-deal Brexit, but Gibraltar is not covered by this arrangement.
Spain refuses to acknowledge the UK’s sovereignty over the strip of land in the north of Gibraltar on which the airport sits.
The Treaty of Utrecht, under which Spain ceded Gibraltar to the UK, does not recognise British sovereignty over the rock, past the old town as it was in 1713.
The UK’s deputy ambassador to the EU, Katrina Williams, has rejected the language in the legislation, and said that the UK’s claim over the Rock should also be included.
She said the UK ‘reiterates certainty over its sovereignty over Gibraltar, including the territory in which Gibraltar airport is situated’.
EU sources said the UK should realise that leaving the EU will have repercussions.
The isthmus was ceded implicitly in the Treaty of Utrecht, the “killing zone” (glacis) in front of the walls is part of the “fortifications”. It was then EXPLICITLY ceded in the Treaty of Seville 1729, with measurements (2 cannon shots from the walls), which gave the frontier the shape it has today. Franco’s insistence that the frontier was at the walls (which various sieges never reached) is a blatant fallacy which ignores reality, like the rest of spain’s propaganda exercise against Gibraltar.