The Guardia Civil have said that they cannot protect Spanish fishermen against the “aggression” of Gibraltar, backup by the Royal Navy, and as such have asked for the Spanish Navy to help protect them.
The Guardia Civil said in a statement that it is a question of “David against Goliath… we have a 12 metre long patrol boat armed with one machine gun, they have a 70 meter long armed frigate of the Royal Navy, [one of] the most powerful naval vessels in the area”. They added that it was like sending a Guardia Civil patrol car up against a fully armored tank.
Seeing as to how British nuclear subs, and some of the most advanced destroyers of the Royal Navy are based at Gib, I fail to see exactly what a 30 year old Spanish Navy patrol boat is expected to do in a fist fight, but there you go.
The situation flamed up again last night when a Gib police boat told Spanish fishermen, who had approached the rock under cover of darkness, to clear off. Spain appears to be using the Gib problem to distract locals from the worrying economic news – Gib, which doesn’t really have a fishing fleet, is surrounded by three square km of fish rich waters. Spain has emptied the rest of the Med and now wants to do the same to the few fishies left swimming in Gib port.
Err … You do know that there are no frigates of destroyers belonging to the royal navy here in gib port right? I mean the argument that the guardia civil boats are fearful is rubbish considering that they out number and out gun the local police vessels… You need to check where you got this information from because I believe that you have been misinformed big time!
Story in El Mundo, so no surprise there! Spanish propaganda! And if we don’t have any RN vessels in Gib, why not? Send in a gunboat up the Guadalquivir and shell Seville, that’ll sort out those damn Andaluzes!