Falkland Islands' Sovereignty Threatened?

[Ashworth-Attwater]

Screw colonialism!

Argentina is a colonial country. Well played, sir.

????

[Ifreann]

Screw colonialism!

Las Malvinas son Penguinas!!

The penguins have taken steps to protect their territory.

[Vassenor]

Argentina is a colonial country. Well played, sir.

????

Argentina only exists because of Spanish colonisation of South America.

[Camelza]

They didn't vote to join Argentina.

Already covered the point but you don't seem to read my posts.

Oh boy, where do I begin.

Lol no. The right of self-determination is not a right acknowledged to just any community established within a given territory, but only to peoples. Article 1 in both the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights reads: "All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development. " The inhabitants of the Malvinas Islands are not recognised as ''people'' by the United Nations. There is a difference between this case and the classical colonial case which a native people is victim of colonialism. The UK occupied the islands and expelled the state that had sovereignty over them.

Self-determination is a well-established principle of contemporary International Law. The practice of its exercising however is a political rather than legal process, indeed the UN Charter enshrining that same principle has no relevant list of nations/peoples appended, leaving open the key practical question: Who is entitled to self-determination and who is not? In each particular case, for self-determination to take place there should be a community of people considering themselves a distinct nation/people in the first place, then they must claim their right to self-determination and the opportunity to choose a self-determination option of their preference, and last but not least, that claim needs to be recognized by the respective central government.

More often than not this process goes not without obstacles and hardship; it suffices to mention the self-determination of the Kurdish, Palestinian, Timorese or Tibetan people. This has nothing to do with numerical strength as some people wrongly believe; indeed the Kurds number over 20 millions. At the same time the New Zealand possession of Tokelau, whose population is just half that of the Falklands, has its right to self-determination duly recognized both by New Zealand and the UN alike.

The Falkland Islanders are a nation same like the Scots, the Welsh or the English – or the people of Tokelau for that matter. Moreover, their right to self-determination has already been officially and formally recognized and guaranteed by the British Government through the process of enacting the 1985 Falklands Constitution. This act of transfer of prerogatives from London to Stanley entails that any future decisions regarding the sovereignty of the Falklands would be up to the Islanders alone to make, and this is irreversible. Once recognized/granted, the self-determination cannot be taken away.

Yet even the Falklands self-determination has been achieved not without the determined bold effort of the Falkland Islanders themselves, a turning point probably being their successful rejection and blocking of the attempted ‘lease back solution’ back in the Nineteen-seventies.

It must be pointed out that Falklands self-determination is an internal affair between the Falklands people on the one hand, represented by their elected government exercising sovereignty on the Islands themselves, and the British Government on the other hand exercising Falklands sovereignty internationally. Neither Argentina nor the UN could be parties to this bilateral business.

Even today it is the colonial government that decides the composition of the population of the territory: the expelled Argentinian population was not allowed to return to the Malvinas.

You mean prisoners and 20-something gauchos, all of whom were Spanish subjects...? Also, nowhere is written anything about British driving away Argentinians from the islands. Anyway, the Falklands are part of a free country, I bet you can go yourself over there and live the life to make sure of it.

Absolutely no UN resolution had referred to the principle of self-determination when it comes to the Malvinas. The GA rejected including this principle in the resolutions about the Malvinas Islands. The current inhabitants are British, but the territory is not.
Furthermore, from the perspective of international law a referendum doesn't change anything. It does not change the essence of the conflict and does not end the dispute or the unquestionable Argentina rights over the Malvinas.

Argentina bases its whole claim on a Spanish imperial claim, that Spain has long forgotten. The islands became British before Argentina even came to be. It's downright ridiculous and hypocritical.
Let's inspect history a bit...
Both the British and Spanish settlements coexisted in the archipelago until 1774, when Britain's new economic and strategic considerations led it to voluntarily withdraw from the islands, leaving a plaque claiming the Falklands for King George III. West Falkland was left abandoned, and Puerto Soledad became mostly a prison camp. Amid the British invasions of the Río de la Plata during the Napoleonic Wars in Europe, the islands' Spanish governor evacuated the archipelago in 1806; Spain's remaining colonial garrison followed suit in 1811, except for gauchos and fishermen who remained voluntarily.

Thereafter, the archipelago was visited only by fishing ships; its political status was undisputed until 1820, when Colonel David Jewett, an American privateer working for the United Provinces of the River Plate, informed anchored ships about Buenos Aires' 1816 claim to Spain's territories in the South Atlantic. Since the islands had no permanent inhabitants, in 1823 Buenos Aires granted German-born merchant Luis Vernet permission to conduct fishing activities and exploit feral cattle in the archipelago. Vernet settled at the ruins of Puerto Soledad in 1826, and accumulated resources on the islands until the venture was secure enough to bring settlers and form a permanent colony(but he never made it). Buenos Aires named Vernet military and civil commander of the islands in 1829, and he attempted to regulate sealing to stop the activities of foreign whalers and sealers. Vernet's venture lasted until a dispute over fishing and hunting rights led to a raid by the American warship USS Lexington in 1831, when United States Navy commander Silas Duncan declared the dissolution of the island's government.

Buenos Aires attempted to retain influence over the settlement by installing a garrison, but they declared mutiny in 1832. In 1833 the arrival of British forces reasserted Britain's rule in the abandoned islands.

So, Argentina claims the islands on the logic of "We tried to make a colony there and claim it because it was a Spanish colony ...partially ...and we were Spanish colonials ...short of".
My advice? Better go after Antarctica...

[Lady Scylla]

There are dozens of actual countries who support me.

So? That's not going to help you win this argument right here.

If we can even remotely consider that an "argument"

[Ashworth-Attwater]

There are dozens of actual countries who support me.

So? That's not going to help you win this argument right here.

I'm not interested in winning this argument here. This forum has clear pro-Western/pro-British bias.

[HMS Vanguard]

Screw colonialism!

Argentina is a colonial country. Well played, sir.

This is the root of the dispute: having the Falklands dispute, however flimsily grounded it may be, allows Argentina to present itself internally as being on the side of the angels. Rather than a transplanted settler colony - an imperialist state without the wealth, power or glory that is supposed to go with it - Argentina can pretend that it is part of the oppressed Third World. That its claim to be such is ridiculous is precisely why they have to grasp so tightly to it.

[Mesoland]

Argentina is a colonial country. Well played, sir.

????

Argentina wish to take over a territory against the wishes of the entirety of its inhabitants. That's the pinnacle of colonialism.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

????

Argentina only Latin America as it exists today exists because of Spanish colonisation of South America.

FTFY

[Mesoland]

So? That's not going to help you win this argument right here.

I'm not interested in winning this argument here. This forum has clear pro-Western/pro-British bias.

Why are you commenting in a debate then? And what do you expect from an English-language forum owned by an Australian and based in the west?

[The Greater Aryan Race]

So? That's not going to help you win this argument right here.

I'm not interested in winning this argument here. This forum has clear pro-Western/pro-British bias.

And yet ten times out of ten, a supporter of Argentinian annexation of the Falklands has been allowed to create thread after thread on the same old issue even after being debunked multiple times. Crazy, crazy world.

[Lady Scylla]

Argentina is a colonial country. Well played, sir.

This is the root of the dispute: having the Falklands dispute, however flimsily grounded it may be, allows Argentina to present itself internally as being on the side of the angels. Rather than a transplanted settler colony - an imperialist state without the wealth, power or glory that is supposed to go with it - Argentina can pretend that it is part of the oppressed Third World. That its claim to be such is ridiculous is precisely why they have to grasp so tightly to it.

Had to look it up. They are a third-world country. Huh.

[Paredonia]

So? That's not going to help you win this argument right here.

I'm not interested in winning this argument here. This forum has clear pro-Western/pro-British bias.

Because in this matter, the UK IS in the right. Argentina is wrong.

[Lady Scylla]

I'm not interested in winning this argument here. This forum has clear pro-Western/pro-British bias.

Why are you commenting in a debate then? And what do you expect from an English-language forum owned by an Australian and based in the west?

It's pretty obvious why. Just ignore him, no need to continue that part of the discussion.

[Dooom35796821595]

So? That's not going to help you win this argument right here.

I'm not interested in winning this argument here. This forum has clear pro-Western/pro-British bias.

Well played, just how argintena does it. "We're not talking to you because you don't completely agree with our stupid hypocrisy". Well good luck with your temper tantrum, I have to find out why Netflix never seem to have the second season of non original shows.

[Viking Confederacy]

But then we would be oppressing space!!

Who cares about space? We haven't even found a living being up there, and no, bacteria don't count.

Of all the bigoted, multi-cell-centric comments...

I'll have you know, I am a strong supporter of single-cell rights, and I shall spew hate, shame and derision upon you if you do not immediately begin caring as deeply as I about the plight of the poor, helpless, exploited and abused bacterial beings in the universe. If we do not defend them and give them a voice, then who will?

[Camelza]

Yay! Screw self-determination!

Screw colonialism!

*snarky grin*

[Soldati Senza Confini]

This is the root of the dispute: having the Falklands dispute, however flimsily grounded it may be, allows Argentina to present itself internally as being on the side of the angels. Rather than a transplanted settler colony - an imperialist state without the wealth, power or glory that is supposed to go with it - Argentina can pretend that it is part of the oppressed Third World. That its claim to be such is ridiculous is precisely why they have to grasp so tightly to it.

Had to look it up. They are a third-world country. Huh.

I really dislike third world for an economic term.

But yes, Argentina is a politically third world country. It's relatively developed though.

[Viking Confederacy]

How about we evacuate the islands and give them to the US as a naval base, we always need more bases.

Finally! A reasonable solution!

[Soldati Senza Confini]

Who cares about space? We haven't even found a living being up there, and no, bacteria don't count.

Of all the bigoted, multi-cell-centric comments...

I'll have you know, I am a strong supporter of single-cell rights, and I shall spew hate, shame and derision upon you if you do not immediately begin caring as deeply as I about the plight of the poor, helpless, exploited and abused bacterial beings in the universe. If we do not defend them and give them a voice, then who will?

*washes hands with soap*

Sorry, you were saying? I can't hear you too well under the noise of running tap water.

[Lady Scylla]

Had to look it up. They are a third-world country. Huh.

I really dislike third world for an economic term.

But yes, Argentina is a politically third world country. It's relatively developed though.

Apparently it still has undeveloped sectors because of a large lack of long-term investment thanks to its incapability to remain stable.

[Mefpan]

I propose a fundraising campaign to physically relocate the Falkland Islands to the North Sea.

Because seriously, despite what some people say, the Malvinas are not a thing that exists. So long as they're called the Falklands Argentina can screw right the hell off.

[Ashworth-Attwater]

????

Argentina wish to take over a territory against the wishes of the entirety of its inhabitants. That's the pinnacle of colonialism.

Colonialism is the establishment of a colony in one territory by a political power from another territory, and the subsequent maintenance, expansion, and exploitation of that colony. The term is also used to describe a set of unequal relationships between the colonial power and the colony and often between the colonists and the indigenous peoples.

Argentina doesn't wish to treat the Falklands as a colony. In fact, they've repeatedly Falklanders would have the same rights as any Argentine citizen and would be allowed to maintain their culture.

On the other hand, the Falklanders only acquired British citizenship after the war and currently, the Falklands are a BOT which means they're not part of the UK yet are still under their jurisdiction. It's the UK who treats the Falklands as a colony, not Argentina.

[Cohina]

PIRATES GO HOME

[Paredonia]

Argentina wish to take over a territory against the wishes of the entirety of its inhabitants. That's the pinnacle of colonialism.

Colonialism is the establishment of a colony in one territory by a political power from another territory, and the subsequent maintenance, expansion, and exploitation of that colony. The term is also used to describe a set of unequal relationships between the colonial power and the colony and often between the colonists and the indigenous peoples.

Argentina doesn't wish to treat the Falklands as a colony. In fact, they've repeatedly Falklanders would have the same rights as any Argentine citizen and would be allowed to maintain their culture.

On the other hand, the Falklanders only acquired British citizenship after the war and currently, the Falklands are a BOT which means they're not part of the UK yet are still under their jurisdiction. It's the UK who treats the Falklands as a colony, not Argentina.

And yet the Falkland Islanders want absolutely nothing to do with Argentina. It's almost as if they LIKE being British. Who'da thunk it?

PIRATES GO HOME

How are WE the pirates? Argentina is the country trying to steal that land, NOT us!