Passions Flare over the Falkland Islands

Passions over the Falklands have been increasing over the past week, on Tuesday the Falklands legislature announced that it will be holding a referendum in 2013. The Referendum will be on whether or not the Islanders wish to remain British or have their sovereignty transferred to Argentina. We all know what the outcome of this referendum will be; a strong pro-British result, probably similar to Gibraltar’s referendums in 1967 and 2002 which produced a pro-British majority of 99% and 98% respectively.

Later on in the week the President of Argentina, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, spoke at the UN Commission for Decolonisation she said “How can it be claimed that, 14,000 kilometres away, it can be part of the British territory?” Also present at the commission were some members of the Falkland Islands’ legislator who claimed that Argentina was trying to bully the Falklands into submission.  Mike Summers, one of the legislators present said “As much as Argentina might like to airbrush us out of existence to satisfy its unjustified lust for our lands, such behaviour belongs to another era and should not be tolerated in the modern world.”

David Cameron has promised the islanders that Britain will not open talks with Argentina until the Falklands want to open talks.

Argentina will continue to try and push Britain into handing over sovereignty of the Falklands to her; recently Argentina has managed to get the backing of basically all of Latin America. Yet Brazil and other South American countries do not want to cut themselves off from Britain totally and are increasingly wary of Argentina’s rhetoric. Some Argentinian politicians believe that Fernandez will only succeed in cutting Argentina off from the outside world. Fernandez should also not underestimate the support Britain has for her claim.  Both the Commonwealth and the EU strongly support Britain’s position, as does the USA; this is almost half of the world’s population and a major stumbling block for Argentina.

Despite all the passions surrounding the Falkland islands, the referendum next year will prove once and for all that the Falkland islanders do NOT want to be Argentinian.

Fernandez does not seem able to comprehend the ideal of self-determination.
source: ITV News