People have been leaving Spain – the prime minister to attend the European Summit, large numbers of Spanish and foreign citizens to seek their fortunes elsewhere, and at least one police patrol-boat (reportedly) to explore the waters off Gibraltar. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy set off for this week’s European Council meeting in Brussels with an unusually strong mandate to “fight for Spain” (the striking expression sprinkled liberally into media statements by government spokespeople) having secured cross-party support for a ten-point negotiating platform. The platform is not substantially different from what Madrid and other capitals on the EU’s troubled periphery have been demanding … [Read more...] about Tales for Tapas: Leaving Spain
Gibraltar
Gibraltar: Fish, football and frontiers
On September 25, Mariano Rajoy took the podium at the UN General Assembly in New York, where Spain was hoping to win a rotating seat on the Security Council. The Spanish prime minister chose the moment to press for joint talks with the UK about the sovereignty of Gibraltar. He called on London to “reinitiate bilateral dialogue on the decolonisation of Gibraltar… We have now lost too many years.” Unsurprisingly, Spain failed to secure a seat on the Security Council, and London issued a waspish response, denying that decolonisation was even an appropriate concept: “The 2006 Gibraltar Constitution provides for a modern and mature relationship between Gibraltar and the UK. This description … [Read more...] about Gibraltar: Fish, football and frontiers