The Diplomat
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is in coordination with the Ministry of Defense in order to charter an aircraft to repatriate the Spanish victims of the shipwreck of a fishing boat in the waters of the Falkland Islands, according to diplomatic sources, who added that the device will carry a diplomat to monitor operations.
“Foreign Ministry is in coordination with Defense to charter an aircraft to the Falkland Islands,” Ministry sources reported yesterday. “Foreign Ministry will deploy a diplomat to monitor the repatriation operation of the Spaniards,” they continued. “Faced with an emergency of this magnitude, the Government does not spare resources to care for Spaniards and bring them to Spain as soon as possible,” added the Department headed by José Manuel Albares.
Ten Spaniards were traveling on the fishing boat Argos Georgia when it was shipwrecked in the waters of the Falkland Islands. Six have been rescued alive and two others have died. The other two remain missing, but the Falkland authorities have decided to suspend search operations due to bad weather conditions.
For his part, Albares himself assured yesterday on Galician television that the Ministry is speaking with the owner of the fishing vessel to organize the repatriation and specified that the six survivors, “who are physically well,” are on board another fishing vessel which is currently taking them to Port Stanley, the capital of the Falkland Islands.
The president of the Fisheries Committee of the European Parliament, Carmen Crespo (EPP, ES), yesterday expressed her solidarity with the Galician people, “so closely linked to the fishing sector and where several of the missing crew members of the ship Argos Georgia come from” .
“On my first day as Chairman of Parliament’s Fisheries Committee, my thoughts are with the missing fishermen in the Falkland Islands and their families. We sincerely hope that his rescue is completed soon,” she stated. “This accident highlights the harshness of fishing activity and the sacrifice and risk that sea professionals experience,” she concluded.
