Argentina will control the Falkland Islands within 20 years, the country’s foreign minister claimed today.
Visiting London for the first time, Hector Timerman ruled out a military solution to the long-standing dispute over sovereignty, but said Britain was internationally isolated in its claim to the islands.
He denounced the British as “fanatics” and said they were only interested in the islands because of their oil reserves.
“The United Kingdom has never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity to find a solution for the Malvinas (the Argentine name for the islands),” he said.
“I don’t think it will take another 20 years. I think that the world is going through a process of understanding more and more that this is a colonial issue, an issue of colonialism, and that the people living there were transferred to the islands.
“We have been trying to find a peaceful solution for 180 years. I think the fanatics are not in Buenos Aires (but) maybe in the United Kingdom because they are 14,000km (8,700 miles) away from the islands.
“And I think they are using the people living in the islands for political (reasons) and to have access to oil and natural resources which belong to the Argentine people. I think we are not fanatical at all.”
He also hit back at suggestions that the government in Buenos Aires had been agitating over the issue of the islands in attempt to distract from severe economic problems at home.
“I think it is the United Kingdom that is going through an economic crisis and is becoming isolationist more than Argentina. They want to get out of the European Union, there is a sense here (in Britain) that we want to stop the world and get out,” he said.