By Andrew Watson
Reviving an old matter of dispute, Argentinian Foreign Minister Hector Timerman has accused the United Kingdom of deploying nuclear weapons near the Falkland Islands.
In 1982, Britain and Argentina fought a war over the disputed British-ruled Falkland Islands. The U.K. rejects any demands from Argentina for sovereignty negotiations unless the approximately 3000 people on the island want to hold talks.
Timerman called out on the United Nations to mediate the age-old dispute over the islands. He said that Argentina was in possession of intelligence that the British had deployed the nuclear submarine, Vanguard, on the island.
Alongside a picture of the Vanguard submarine, Timerman also showed pictures of a ship and plane which he claimed were respectively the British naval destroyer, Dauntless; and the British aircraft; Typhoon. He added that all three were deployed near the Falkland Islands.
Timerman alleged that Britain had used an "unjustified defense of self-determination" in maintaining a military base on the Falklands, which Argentinians refer to as Islas Malvinas. He claimed that doing so allowed the European power to dominate the Atlantic Ocean.
"The UK is using an unjustified defense of self-determination for two thousand five hundred inhabitants as an excuse to establish a military powerful base that is serving its strategic interests," Timerman told reporters. "And I say it's an unjustified defense because the United Nations from 1965 has said that the conflict is a sovereignty conflict between the UK and Republic of Argentina."
Britain's UN ambassador Mark Lyall Grant responded to these allegation by rejecting any claims that the United Kingdom is "militarizing" the Falklands.
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon released a statement, expressing "concern about the increasingly strong exchanges" between the governments. After undertaking talks with Timerman, Ban Ki-moon said that the U.N. would be happy to intervene in the situation, if it were asked to do so.
The dispute comes before the 30th anniversary of the Falklands war, even more so as oil exploration by British companies off the islands further upped tensions regarding territorial dispute.
