OLIVE PRESS
The
GIBRALTAR
FREE
GIBRALTAR’S port has accepted new plans to remove the shipwreck of the OS 35 that beached 700 metres from Catalan Bay. It has given salvage and wreck removal company TMC Marine the green light to go ahead with breaking up and taking away the ship that caused an extensive oil spill last September. TMC Marine chose Dutch company Koole Contractors for the task on October 21. It then worked out in more detail how exactly Koole Contractors would carry out the job in its proposal to the Port. TMC Marine presented the revised plans to the Gibraltar Port Authority on November 9. Captain of the Port John Ghio’s approval gives the go-ahead for Koole Contractors to move into the area its large floating barges with cranes that can lift up to 500 tons.
Milestone
The process follows the Port’s order to remove the OS 35 shipwreck before May 30. “This critical milestone is an important step in ensuring that the removal of the wreck is completed within the timeframe established by the Gibraltar Port Authority in the Wreck Removal Notice,” Ghio said. “It also confirms that the methodology and efficiency of the works envisaged are deliverable at the same time as being fully compatible with the strictest measures for the protection of the environment.” The OS 35 beached itself off Catalan Bay after getting a ten metre gash from a collision with another ship while leaving the Bay of Gibraltar on August 29. Police have since charged its captain for causing an oil spill which soiled local beaches and killed off wildlife.
Vol. 6 Issue 187 www.theolivepress.es November 30th - December 13th 2022
Nursery rhyme time
Gibraltar literary festival, see our special report
THE youngest children at Governor’s Meadow Lower Primary School dressed up for World Nursery Rhyme Week that pushed them to learn early writing and reading skills. The nursery level kids dressed up as nursery rhyme characters and thoroughly enjoyed all the activities based on the different traditional stories.
DEAL ON THE CARDS
EU treaty hopes run high as talks progress AN EU treaty for Gibraltar could be signed by the end of the year, leaders in Gibraltar and Spain have said. The Rock’s Chief Minister Fabian Picardo said he is ‘confident’ of a ‘positive outcome’ to post-Brexit talks between UK and Spain which could see the frontier removed and create a shared prosperity solution to Brexit. Picardo said he now expects ‘a successful conclusion’ to the talks over an EU treaty with the UK for at least the next four years. Jose Manuel Albares, Spanish Foreign Minister, told reporters talks ‘are in a very advanced phase’ and can be ‘defined as very positive’. He added the new EU treaty would allow ‘maximum freedom of people and goods’ into and out of Gibraltar. Albares told reporters that the UK already has a European Commis-
By John Culatto & Simon Hunter
sion proposal that has ‘global, balanced and technical solutions’ for the problems raised by Brexit on Gibraltar. One of the main issues continues to be who would control access to Spain at the airport and seaport. In the EU mandate for the negotiations - which Picardo flatly rejected - Spain pushed for its own police to manage the border. But Gibraltar has always said this would cross one of its red lines and instead is bidding for Frontex to carry out Schengen checks. One possible solution is that air passengers flying into Spain would not even enter Gibraltar at all, instead being routed straight onto Spanish territory. The airport was THE SKY designed with this possibility DOCTOR in mind under the 2006 CorALL AREAS doba AgreeCOVERED ment. It is equipped 4G UNLIMITED with a back entrance that INTERNET could be conIDEAL FOR nected to Spain, although this STREAMING TV option was nevALSO er used. IPTV, The exchange SATELLITE TV
X
Shipwreck nears end
The Rock’s ONLY free local paper
+
952 147 834
+
tel: (0034) 952 763 840 info@theskydoctor.com www.theskydoctor.com
STATEMENTS: Franco (left) and Albares have both been vocal
with Albares followed a week of uncertainty when Picardo indicated that the negotiations were far from over. “We are not there yet,” he had said in a government statement on November 18.
Optimistic
He added ‘crossing t’s and dotting i’s’ would occur ‘at the right moment’ and admitted ‘a lot of hard work and good faith’ had been put in ‘by all relevant parties’. After Picardo’s earlier doubts, he sounded far more positive on November 25 and even hinted the EU treaty could be signed ‘this year’. His optimism came after Albares warned that ‘we cannot be in this situation forever’. The Spanish foreign minister was referring to Gibraltar’s current limbo of being outside the EU while having all the privileges of its
members for nearly two years. He stressed that Spain has shown a ‘high level of flexibility and pragmatism to find a solution to the challenges’. Despite opposition from the Junta de Andalucia, Mayor of La Linea Juan Franco said the agreement is a sign that ‘sanity prevails’. Franco now hopes La Linea could now become one of the biggest winners in the shared prosperity proposal, with Gibraltar boosting the frontier city’s economic outlook.
Tel: 952 147 834
See pages 15 & 16
TM
Not easy
While Picardo suggested that a no deal was still a possibility he confirmed all sides were ‘on the same page in this objective’. “This has not been easy and what is left is not easy either,” Picardo concluded. “But we remain committed to a positive outcome. “A positive outcome can now be achieved. A positive outcome must now be the result.” Spanish, UK and Gibraltar delegations took part in the last round of meetings on November 28-29 in London.