Spain will have the final say on who enters Gibraltar under a preliminary agreement on border arrangements for the territory of the United Kingdom, Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez Laya told El Pais in a statement. interview.
The responsibility for monitoring the new conditions of the Schengen agreement without a passport for entry into the port and airport of Gibraltar, as provided for in the agreement, will lie with Spain, Gonzalez told the newspaper.
“Obviously, there must be a Spanish presence to carry out the minimum Schengen control tasks,” she said.
Under the agreement, however, none of the governments gave an inch in their claims to sovereignty over the territory, she told El Pais.
“What we have seen is a paradigm shift that is not about concessions, but about a convergence of interests between Gibraltarians and Spaniards, both pro-European,” Gonzalez said. “This is the fruit of Brexit.”
Separately, Fabian Picardo, the Prime Minister of Gibraltar, said that only the Gibraltar authorities will decide who enters the territory.
“Under the New Year’s Agreement, only Gibraltar will decide who enters Gibraltar, and Spanish officers will not exercise any control in Gibraltar at the airport or port now or in four years,” he said on Twitter. “This is our land.”
Spain and Britain concluded a last-minute agreement on 31 December to avoid stricter controls on the movement of people and goods to the territory at the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea under British control since 1713.
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Over a four-year implementation period, officials from the European border agency Frontex will help control the port and airport, and Spain is the party responsible for overseeing the new Schengen agreements.
Britain remains firm in its support for Gibraltar and its sovereignty has been protected, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said on Thursday.
(Updates with comments from the Prime Minister of Gibraltar on the seventh paragraph.)