Spanish threat to scupper deal over Gibraltar
SPAIN yesterday threatened to block the Brexit agreement with 11th-hour demands over Gibraltar.
Madrid is furious about a section of the draft withdrawal document agreed last week relating to the British overseas territory.
It fears Article 184 – a five-line passage in the 585-page agreement – will mean losing control over how a future trading relationship applies to The Rock.
It is calling for extra text to spell out in no uncertain terms that any future trade deal must be agreed bilaterally between the UK and Spain first.
The last-minute demands threw the timetable for agreeing Theresa May’s deal with Brussels into doubt last night ahead of a special summit of EU leaders on Sunday. A revised political declaration setting out the parameters of a future relationship, a separate document to the withdrawal agreement, was due to be published today.
But diplomats last night said they now expect this to be delayed until later in the week.
After leaving a briefing between the EU’s Brexit chief Michel Barnier and member states yesterday, Josep Borrell, Spain’s foreign affairs minister, said Madrid had learnt of Article 184 only last Wednesday.
He said: ‘The negotiations between the United Kingdom and the EU do not apply to Gibraltar. Future negotiations on Gibraltar are separate negotiations. And that is what must be made clear. Until we have the future declaration and we know what it says, whether we agree or not, we are also not going to approve the withdrawal agreement.
‘In these negotiations, things always come up at the last moment and that is what we are going to see.
‘I cannot say that things are fixed 100 per cent. The negotiations may not be so peaceful as they seem. In Europe, it is not over until it’s over. You have always got to be prepared for a surprise at the last minute.’ Negotiators are likely to add a clarification to the draft political declaration, which is still being finalised, rather than reopen the 585-page agreement.
Madrid has a long-standing claim on Gibraltar, which was ceded to the British crown in the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht.
According to Article 184 of the draft divorce deal, ‘the EU and the United Kingdom shall make every effort, in good faith and with full respect for their respective legal systems, to adopt the measures necessary to negotiate rapidly the agreements governing their future relationship’. This future relationship will be negotiated during the transition period, which begins after Brexit day on March 29, and is set to end in December 2020.
Spain says the passage does not spell out clearly enough that any deal reached between the EU and UK will not automatically apply to Gibraltar.
Although Spain could not veto the final legal agreement under EU Council voting rules, officials said nothing would be progressed until all member states were on board.
Fabian Picardo, Gibraltar’s chief minister, said: ‘The language of vetos and exclusions should be the language of the past. It has no place in the modern Europe of today at a time when both the UK and Gibraltar are trying to build a new positive future relationship with the EU.
‘It’s no surprise that we are seeing the Spanish government raise issues at the last minute.
‘The position taken by the Spanish Government today does little to build mutual confidence and trust.’
In other developments yesterday a group of member states led by France is challenging Britain over post-Brexit fishing rights. The countries rely on EU-allocated quotas of fish from UK waters and have made it clear they want a guarantee of continued access.
Separately, the Netherlands alongside France is pushing for tougher commitments to keep Britain more tightly aligned with the bloc’s trading rules – ‘a level playing field’.
‘Prepared for a surprise’