SPANISH RESEARCH VESSEL PROMPTS BRITISH COMPLAINT

 A Spanish research vessel was ordered out of British waters yesterday after it was spotted gathering water samples on the east side of the Rock.

The Emma Bardan, a 200-tonne oceanographic and fisheries research vessel operated by Spain’s Ministry for Agriculture, Food and the Environment, stopped its activities when confronted by the Royal Navy’s Gibraltar Squadron.

The Spanish had been sailing in between vessels anchored in British waters off the east side.

Shadowed by the Royal Navy, it then sailed round the Rock

only to stop in the middle of the bay in a standoff with the Royal Navy.

At one point, Guardia Civil vessels were also spotted at the scene, as were boats from the Royal Gibraltar Police and the Gibraltar Defence Police.

A spokesman for the Convent said officials at the Foreign & Commonwealth Office in London and the British embassy in Madrid had been informed immediately of the incident.

“A formal complaint will be lodged,” he said.

The Emma Bardan was last spotted in British Gibraltar territorial waters in December last year, when it was also ordered out after it was seen carrying out survey work.

That incident, which coincided with the Spanish Government approving a law that purported to control environmental matters in British waters, also led to a formal complaint.

The vessel’s presence in Gibraltar yesterday coincided with widespread media interest in Spain over a shipment of rocks bound for Gibraltar from Portugal by sea.