* Cesar Lerena The Minister for the Americas of the United Kingdom Alan Duncan wrote in his memoirs that, at the time of the so-called Foradori-Duncan Pact, the Argentine vice-chancellor « Carlos Foradori was so drunk that the next day he could not remember the details of the document » (Télam, 04/26/2022), If this were true, we would be in serious trouble, since our Foreign Ministry has been making decisions that are very favorable to the interests of the United Kingdom and, if we attributed this to alcohol, it would be a epidemic that we could not attribute to the COVID-19 Coronavirus Pandemic, because the British have been advancing on our island and marine territories for more than 40 years. In 1982 they occupied 11,410 km2 and for many years they have invaded 1,639,900 km2 equivalent to 50 % of the Argentine Exclusive Economic Zone. According to the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) «The harmful use of alcohol challenges the social and economic development of many countries, including those in the Americas, where consumption is approximately 40% higher than the world average.
In general, this population consumes alcohol in a pattern that is dangerous to health, as well as domestic violence, loss of productivity, and many hidden costs" ( www.paho.org/es/temas/alcohol ). Perhaps, Within these hidden costs , PAHO could have weighed the probable negative effects of alcohol in the decisions of senior diplomats; But, we do not believe that this is the cause, although Mariano Moreno was already worried about this when he said: “ there are decisions that cannot be made either drunk or asleep ,” that is, under any circumstances. To think that Foradori, sober or drunk , made alone the decision of such a transfer, trying to remove responsibility from the President and Minister of that time and, by the way, from the Argentine Foreign Ministry and a person with great power within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs: the General Director of the International Legal Department, in his moment the influential Susana Ruiz Cerutti and the intermittent Deputy Director and now Director, his godson Holger Federico Martinsen.
To rule out the issue of alcohol once and for all, let us keep in mind that the then ambassador Mark Kent was fond of good Scotch whiskey and, however, this did not give rise to this odious pact ending up being a decision unfavorable to the British, but quite the opposite. At this point, if we were tolerant, we could think that Foradori was at least asleep, and ask ourselves how it could have occurred to a career diplomat to close such an agreement in "a fabulous wine cellar, with the walls full of bottles of Merlot" and that it is - precisely - in the embassy of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. We got off to a bad start, “signing” the transfer on British territory, in an area that seems more conducive to stale libations than to the treatment of issues related to Argentine sovereignty.Yes we know that the pact was difficult, Foradori entered the winery on September 12 and sealed the pact, on the fateful Tuesday the 13th at dawn. In reality, no one in their right mind or who did not have the mandate to favor the interests British in Malvinas could agree to "adopt appropriate measures to remove all obstacles that limit the economic growth and sustainable development of the Malvina Islands, including trade, fishing, navigation and hydrocarbons." A true unconditional cession; a definitive surrender of the exercise of full sovereignty of the Malvinas and a clear violation of the First Transitional Provision of the Constitution. We then rule out that to “close” the Pact, Vice Chancellor Foradori was drunk. Because if that were the case, what would be the alcohol content? of subsequent officials who, having already passed six years of the Pact, still maintain it in force? The secretary of Malvinas of the Argentine Foreign Ministry, Guillermo Carmona, refers that the " Government of President Alberto Fernández carried out a series of actions to nullify all practical issues and subsequent agreements arising from the joint statement issued in September 2016 .
Here the secretary, intentionally or mistakenly, limited the actions to the subsequent agreements that derived from the Pact in question and, omits to say that the most serious damage caused by this agreement - that is what it is about when the so-called "joint communiqué" refers in its text seven times to the word "agree" - is the "de facto" ratification of the Madrid Agreements and the Umbrella formula, which can be interpreted that the dialogue that the Argentine Foreign Ministry repeatedly demands is being carried out by the United Kingdom, To such an extent that Argentina promises to remove all obstacles to the development of the Malvinas and the continuity of the aforementioned Madrid Agreements. Likewise, the United Kingdom continues to grant illegal fishing licenses to third countries in violation of Res.31/ 49 of the United Nations without initiating actions against the licensed companies, for violation of laws 24,922 (1998) and 27,564 (2020) and in some cases Law 26,386 that prevents companies based on the Argentine continent from operating in the Malvinas and, this It means the annual extraction of Argentine fishing resources of the order of 250,000 tons, valued without process at about one billion dollars.
Likewise, the Argentine authorities have not canceled the authorization for Latam flights from Malvinas to Chile and vice versa, and the Malvinas Secretariat, at the request of the self-appointed Marcelo Kohen, proposed in December 2021 to the United Kingdom to carry out “humanitarian flights.” with the company Aerolíneas Argentinas so that the islanders can leave the islands to reunite with their families, becoming the unprecedented fact that the invaded country offers humanitarian flights to the invader, falling within a reiterated and inconducive Argentine policy of unilateral cooperation. It is also still in force. the granting by tender in 2019 of an area with more than 100 thousand km2 for offshore hydrocarbon exploitation in the Malvinas Basin, between the archipelagos and the Argentine continent to oil companies of British origin and/or that have intervened in exploitations in the Malvinas, in open violation of Law 26,659 (Solanas Law), such as Shell, BP Exploration Operating Company Ltd; Tullow Oil and Equinor; like the latter off the coast of Mar del Plata. All without prior and independent environmental impact analysis. The Antarctic cooperation agreement has not been left without effect within the Pact, which constitutes an act of recognition of the British position inadmissible.
It is interesting to transcribe in this regard what Professor Armando Abruza said: «A separate reflection must be made regarding the cooperation agreements with the United Kingdom in terms of scientific research in subantarctic waters surrounding the South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands, in instead of doing so in the multilateral framework of the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR), which constitutes the only legal regime validly applicable in that region. In this matter, it is also appropriate to highlight the technique used in the drafting of the text of the Joint Communiqué, which, as has been expressed, reveals the British authorship of the document, verifiable in this specific case based on its design. Curiously, the topic addressed here was not included along with the other issues mentioned in the chapter ten “South Atlantic”, but is referred to in the last paragraph of chapter three “Science and Technology, Human Rights and Gender Issues”. The situation thus described suggests the British intention to divide the legal object of the controversy, separating to the aforementioned archipelagos that, because they are subantarctic islands, are included in the area of the Convention on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources, of the Malvinas Islands, which are outside the area of said Convention.
The two aspects previously examined seem to confirm the reception in the text of the Joint Communiqué of legal developments favorable to the United Kingdom, necessarily contrary to the position held by our country in the sovereignty controversy over the three southern archipelagos. Any concession that the Argentine Government could carried out in the aforementioned matters, without the prompt resumption of negotiations on sovereignty and without any substantive consideration in exchange, as undoubtedly occurred throughout the 90s and into the current century, would be incompatible with the Provision First Transitory of the National Constitution and harmful to the interests of the Nation. and promotion of British investments that created a privilege regime over other countries and did not repeal Law 25,290 that approved the New York Agreement, which could lead to strengthening the British position in the Malvinas and intervening in the administration of the fishing resources throughout the South Atlantic. In addition to this, the Malvinas Secretariat in these two and a half years of government has not promoted the South Atlantic Peace and Cooperation Zone (1986) endorsed by UN Res. 41/11 , so that all countries in West Africa and East America speak out strongly and take action against the United Kingdom's military presence in the Malvinas.
The slogan that Argentina "adopt appropriate measures to remove all obstacles that limit the economic growth and sustainable development of the Malvinas Islands, including trade, fishing, navigation and hydrocarbons" is still valid and we wonder then on what grounds is it inviting dialogue to the United Kingdom and cooperation. If the Foradori-Duncan Pact had been signed while drunk or asleep, which of these conditions or others justify keeping in force an unworthy Agreement that harms national sovereignty? Dr. César Augusto Lerena President of the Agustina Lerena Foundation (founded 10/21/2002). President of the Fisheries Studies Center (CESPE). Expert in South Atlantic and Fisheries. Former Secretary of State. Former Advisor in the Chamber of Deputies and in the Senate of the Nation. Author of “Malvinas 1982-2022. A heroic deed and 40 years of dedication” (2021) May 7, 2022 ©
