For some time now, the false claim that the Canary Islands, as part of the Spanish State, only have territorial waters and not an Exclusive Economic Zone has been spreading. Such a hoax, without any legal rigor, is intended to be justified both in ...
For some time now, the false claim that the Canary Islands, as part of the Spanish State, only have territorial waters and not an Exclusive Economic Zone has been spreading. Such a hoax, without any legal rigor, is intended to be justified both in that the Canary Islands are not an archipelagic State and that it is an overseas territory of a European State in Africa (sic).
That is absolutely not the case. Each of the Canary Islands, according to article 121 of the Convention on the Sea, by the mere fact of being inhabited, has both territorial waters and an exclusive economic zone. The only island spaces that only have territorial waters and not an exclusive economic zone are the islands (the Convention calls them rocks) not suitable for maintaining human habitation or their own economic life.
That means, like it or not, that the only difference that there could be -which is even questionable, although I recognize that different interpretations are possible- between being an archipelagic State (as is the case of Cape Verde) and an archipelago of State (which is what the Canary Islands are today) is how to delimit those spaces, but in no case is the difference in what spaces they have: in both cases the maritime spaces are the same; that is, both have territorial waters and an exclusive economic zone; in one case counted from the archipelagic perimeter; in the other, measured from the coast of each island.
At most, what we would not have as an archipelago of State and Cape Verde as an archipelagic State would be what are called archipelagic waters, which are the waters enclosed within the straight baselines that connect the outermost points of the islands that make up those archipelagic States.
Overseas territory of a European State in Africa is not a legal status of International Law. It is that of a colony (or, to be more precise, a non-autonomous territory) and the Canary Islands has never appeared in the list of territories qualified as such by the UN and which are in decolonization processes that, let us not forget, implies consulting the population about their political future through self-determination referendums.
In no international norm, I repeat, in none, is it established that, apart from non-autonomous territories and rocks, any land space, be it continent or island, cannot have its own maritime spaces. Consequently, it is false of all falsehood that the Canary Islands does not have its own maritime spaces like any other territory.
However, certain elements self-proclaimed "specialists" in International Maritime Law, seconded by the media by those who share an old pseudo-independentist and pro-Moroccan ideology -there is nothing more anti-Canarian than haranguing the outdated inter-island litigation-, persist in distorting reality without providing any other reasoning to support that the Canary Islands does not have an exclusive economic zone than the attack on those who defend, and argue, postulates contrary to theirs.
There is no other reasoning because there are simply no legal arguments based on the Convention on the Sea that minimally support that invention. They seem to be disciples of Goebbels believing that a lie repeated a thousand times becomes truth. But that is not the case. The really certain thing is that the Canary Islands does have an exclusive economic zone. A different thing is the finding that Spain is incapable of formally agreeing on the delimitation of the median with Morocco.
Surely if the Canary Islands were an archipelagic State it would be easier to do so, since Spanish interests do not coincide with Canarian interests. But we must not confuse desires with reality: today, like it or not, the Canary Islands is part of the Spanish State, but that does not prevent us from having an exclusive economic zone at all.
With respect to the Canary Islands Water Law, I will not tire of insisting that it supposes, for the first time in History, the recognition of the Spanish State, of its Cortes Generales, that the maritime spaces that surround us are part of the entity endowed with political autonomy that today is the Canary Islands, that has an archipelagic dimension and that over our waters we can exercise the same powers that we hold over land, such as, for example, the controversial authorizations on oil exploration.
That this Law is not going to have international repercussions in relation to the delimitation of our spaces according to the criterion of straight baselines is the least because, first, we already have territorial waters and an exclusive economic zone (which is what is not in dispute) and, second, because we have to continue convincing those who must apply it that the Canary Islands is unique and one of those singularities, given our archipelagic dimension, is that the waters that surround us -that separate us, but that also unite us- are Canarian, as are, and I don't think anyone doubts it, the Teide or the Roque Nublo.
As the nationalists of Coalición Canaria we have the firm conviction that these waters can only be Canarian -as are the Roque de los Muchachos or Tindaya- is why we have always sought legal-constitutional mechanisms to recognize that this is so, and resolve through institutional channels the conflicts caused by the continuous refusals of the Spanish governments in turn, whether from the PP or the PSOE.
Precisely, the Canary Islands Water Law is proof of this. If it does not serve, it will mean that we have to look for other formulas, and the truth is that there are not many alternatives left within the current constitutional framework. At least for the narrow-mindedness of those who govern us and yearn for the return to a centralist, authoritarian and suffocating Spanish State. In any case, finding our own space will depend on the sovereign will of the Canarians?
Fernando Ríos Rull, member of the CPN of Coalición Canaria
