Gibraltar bullied by Spain continually and UK seems to neglect Gibraltar and the people!
There is no other place in the world that the process of diplomacy is so weak!
In Gibraltar the incursions by Spanish Paramilitary and the Spanish Navy continue almost everyday!
The Frontier queues continue to be used as a political weapon aimed at causing grief and harassment to all people no matter their nationality, age, sex, age or their health being affected. People are made to stand in a pedestrian queue recently for two hours in the scorching heat and as yet it is not summer! They were also held in queues in this way in the rain and the wind during the winter!
The queues for cars, motorbikes and bicycles suffered the same and even worse waits going up to four or five hours. The reason as and when Madrid Government orders the Para military Guardia Civil to cause them by slowing down their checks to 15 mins a car and checking all as if the people crossing were terrorists!
We have had their riot squads at the border for over 6 months now - these are the black berets para military guys used for big demonstrations or riots or terrorists events. But instead they are here in our Border with Spain as if we the people from both sides were CRIMINALS!
Not only have they got this special forces group doing the border checks but in fact after you think you have crossed into Spain the ordeal is not over as they have another two checks behind the building that you never expected! With one guy who stands with the metal stinger as if ever that was needed! This special force presence is more than enough for people to feel greatly intimidated and scared as if they were committing a crime for just visiting Gibraltar - so much so that our Tourists vow never to return!
So they have found another way to strangle our economy!
However, one thing I am learning and starting to see very clearly is that Spanish Government are not the only enemy of Gibraltar! We have many countries in Europe starting to side with them against us as they did with the exclusion of Gibraltar in the single Sky legislation!
The EU commission has done nothing to help us and I can now understand why! Our issue with Spain is not for the European Union and in fact we are pressuring the wrong side. Don't get me wrong I think we should still apply the pressure there but not without applying the pressure to our UK Government and our Foreign Office who continue to neglect Gibraltar and us the PEOPLE!
If the issues we are facing were being experienced by the Falklands - I can assure you the action would be very very different indeed!
If the incursions in British waters were done say near Devon - I can guarantee you that the result would not be diplomacy tea and cakes!
Our UK Government, Our Governor and the Foreign Office are neglecting the people of Gibraltar of their no action called diplomacy! Who are they kidding with so many diplomatic protests raised in the last 3 years! I am sure we could make a book called the Gibraltar Diplomatic Protests and this book would be thicker than the bible!
We have proved and provide with evidence - the effects of the border queues, the dangers of the continual illegal fishing and the constant incursions! But what have these three entities done for us? NOTHING AT ALL!
We the people of Gibraltar have been part of the European Union since the 1970s and as yet we suffer being treated like third world citizens and continue to be treated unfairly and discriminated in abundance! We were in the EU well before SPAIN! Yet we are discriminated because of our size and because SPAIN does nothing but complain and make up horrendous stories about us that are not true! The EU continue to allow Spain to bully Gibraltar and does nothing to force them to keep to the EU laws and what the institution stands for! It is not uniting with us but against us!
In Gibraltar we have our own EU ID card and we can travel around Europe with no issues but guess where we do get problems? We get the problems entering and leaving UK! Unbelievable is it not?
We are British Citizens- we are in the EU but when a Gibraltarian uses their own EU ID Card it is our very own UK Government who does not recognise our ID cards and we have so much hassle that we all tend to give in and just take our passports so that we do not feel further insulted by this outright discrimination!
Personally I have heard every excuse under the Sun, the latest is that UK have asked our Government to update our ID cards to have a chip - three years and still waiting! So even our own Government are neglecting our right of Freedom of Movement as we are not treated in the same way as other EU nationals!
It is unacceptable that we seem to have to fight for our rights and to have our voices heard with so many attacks on us as a people! IN UK we are treated as foreigners, in EU we are treated as third class citizens and in Spain well they just want my country!
We in Gibraltar are having to bend over backwards to be heard and to have a choice - we have to stop our hunkering but Spain can continue - we stop selling cigarettes cheaply or in quantity but Spain sell them to us in the first place! We keep to EU law about fishing yet Spain is allowed to break the laws in Gibraltar on the very laws they dare not break in Spain!
We keep appeasing and they keep bullying! EU do nothing UK Government do nothing! Our Governor does nothing even when the Spanish Navy enter our waters and confront UK Navy and local law enforcements! Our Government does nothing to get our ID cards accepted by our very own Mother Country! The Foreign Commonwealth Office continues to allow the bullying, the fishing, the shooting and the incursions in our waters! The EU leave us out in trying to progress within the EU by creating clauses to leave us out of any agreements etc!
If all this was not serious and true one would think this was all a comedy act! Let me reassure you all this is reality and it should not be accepted by any other country in or out of the EU. So I urge that you all support us by writing to your UK MPs, Your MEPs, To the Prim Minister to state that the way we are being treated is unacceptable!
The latest thing that UK is harming us with is introducing Point of Consumption Tax to our Online Gaming Companies another foundation of our economy - hence I state who really is behaving like an enemy? Why is UK trying to strangle our economy? Are they working with Spain to bring us to our knees?
Please help us fight for our rights and get our voices heard! We need people all over the world and in UK to stand with us not against us! We have been loyal to Our Queen for over three hundred years!
We are British Gibraltarians and Proud to be British! Britain needs to return the same loyalty!
Anne-Marie Struggles
