In a front-page report in Europa Sur today, the Junta de Andalucía has issued an ultimatum to the Government of Gibraltar regarding the scrap-transporting ship New Flame, which hit rocks in the Bay of Algeciras in August, is now broken in two and sinking. The latest storms have apparently shaken the wreck, which is now spilling even more fuel and scrap onto the beaches at Getares and El Rinconcillo in Algeciras.
In an effort to get Gibraltar to accept responsibility for the disaster and for the removal of the vessel, the Junta threatens to take the matter to international courts. The issue could easily become yet another diplomatic incident between Spain, Britain and Gibraltar.
According to a Junta spokesperson, when the ship first went aground, the Junta sent a team of experts to help with its removal, but the team was expelled from the Rock for political reasons as the dates were close to imminent elections there. For its part, Gibraltar refuses to accept that the fuel and scrap spill has nothing to do with the New Flame, an opinion totally contrary to the Junta’s and environmental organizations this side of the frontier. On the other hand, neither is Gibraltar facilitating information about exactly what type of cargo the ship was carrying.
The New Flame apparently sailed from the port of Gibraltar without the full knowledge of the authorities there. Gibraltar has long claimed most of the waters of the Bay of Algeciras as its jurisdiction, a position clearly opposed by various treaties and maritime laws. Now, with a shipwreck in those very waters, the Rock is apparently shirking its moral and environmental duty to remove it.
Curiously, there is no late news on this matter in at least two of Gibraltar’s newspaper websites (Gibraltar Chronicle and Vox).
