The Diplomat in Spain

Michael Harris addresses the audience before the eyes of Jose Montilla, Timothy Hemmings and María Andrés./ Photo: AR

Alberto Rubio. 11/03/2017

“We just want to stay where we are, upholding our rights as European citizens”, EuroCitizens Vice President Michael Harris said on Wednesday during a discussion on Brexit organized by the European Commission’s Office in Spain.

Harris explained that the objective of EuroCitizens is to defend the European citizenship rights of the britons in Spain and the spaniards in the United Kingdom, namely the freedom to reside, study and work throughout the European Union, and that these rights can not be “cut up”.

In addition to Harris, at the colloquium presented by the director of the European Commission’s Office in Spain, María Andrés, Socialist Senator José Montilla and the British Embassy Minister Timothy Hemmings also participated as speakers.

Montilla stressed that it should be a priority to “clear the unknowns about the situation of citizens” residing outside their respective countries. For his part, Hemmings insisted that the priority of his government is to guarantee the rights that already have the british who are in the EU and those of the europeans in the United Kingdom.

The colloquium attracted a good number of British residents in Spain and many spaniards interested in knowing the consequences of Brexit for ordinary citizens. Because, as Harris pointed out, it is not just the 300,000 britons living in Spain, or the 130,000 spaniards in the UK. There are also three million europeans living in Britain and 1.2 million britons who have settled throughout the European Union.