300 Years of the Treaty of Utrecht and the Unsolved Puzzle of the International Law Status of Gibraltar

Abstract

Due to the different and mutually incompatible interpretations of Article X
of the Treaty of Utrecht of 1713, there is still an ongoing dispute between
the United Kingdom and the Kingdom of Spain on the question of the
sovereignty of Gibraltar. In the United Kingdom’s view, which is largely
shared by legal scholars, Article X of the Treaty of Utrecht grants full and
entire sovereignty over Gibraltar to the UK. Meanwhile, the Kingdom of
Spain argues that Article X yielded to the crown of Great Britain only the
property of Gibraltar’s castle, town and port. Sovereignty over Gibraltar,
however, continued to be retained by the Spanish state. In spite of their
disagreement, both states started negotiating a form of condominium at
the beginning of the 21 st century. In the end, they failed to achieve this
goal, which seems to be incompatible with the UN General Assembly
resolutions on the decolonization of Gibraltar. The people of Gibraltar, who
are the third actor in the Spanish-British dispute, claim their own
sovereignty and their right to self-determination. However, according to the
UN General Assembly, the decolonization of Gibraltar requires as a
precondition that the Kingdom of Spain and the UK solve their dispute on
the question of sovereignty. Otherwise the decolonization of Gibraltar
cannot occur. Both the United Kingdom and the Kingdom of Spain are
European Union members but their inter-state dispute under international
law cannot be solved within the EU context. Thus, three hundred years after
the signature of the Treaty of Utrecht, the future of Gibraltar remains
completely unclear.