Luis Ayllón
The US Embassy in Madrid has made numerous approaches to the Spanish authorities in recent weeks to try to facilitate the passage to Gibraltar of its military personnel stationed at the Rota and Morón de la Frontera bases, The Diplomat has learned from reliable sources.
The negotiations intensified after Spain began to apply stricter requirements for entering and leaving Schengen territory as a result of Brexit. As Gibraltar is a British colony, travellers wishing to enter Spain must do so with a passport and fulfil a series of conditions, from which only Gibraltarians are exempt, while the agreement on the future of the Rock is being negotiated between the European Union and the United Kingdom. Even non-Gibraltarian residents of Gibraltar are not exempt from these requirements.
The problem with the United States came to light after the website Noticias Gibraltar revealed an incident at Easter with US General Marcus Bryant Annibale, stationed in Portugal, who tried to cross the fence without meeting the requirements and without express authorisation from the Spanish government.
The Spanish government noted that, in recent months, there had been an increase in the number of US military personnel entering and leaving the Rock from the Rota naval base, using only their military ID cards, which, according to the Defence Cooperation Agreement between Spain and the United States, are only valid for movement on Spanish territory. The visitors passed through most of the time in field uniforms, claiming to be tourists, sometimes coinciding with the presence of US submarines at the Gibraltar base, as was recently the case with the USS Georgia, whose stopover, incidentally, provoked a Spanish protest.
As Spain began to apply stricter requirements for entering and leaving Gibraltar, the commander of the naval base in Rota, Captain David Baird, issued a statement advising his military not to pass through to the colony and informing them that the US Embassy in Madrid was working to address the problem “at the highest level”.
As The Diplomat has learned, the US diplomatic representation has been making contact with both the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministries of Defence and the Interior, trying to obtain favourable treatment for the US military to cross the border.
Neither the Spanish government nor the US Embassy has wished to comment on the matter, but, according to the sources consulted, so far the talks have not produced satisfactory results for US claims, since the Spanish authorities, who are studying the request, consider that they cannot make exceptions and must apply the same conditions for crossing a Schengen border to all nationals of other countries.
