Argentine President Javier Milei escalated his country’s dispute with Britain over the Falkland Islands on Thursday, vowing new measures to halt an oil project near the British-controlled archipelago, saying his country needs to “recover these islands”.
Milei also praised US President Donald Trump for saying Washington could reconsider its neutral stance on the islands’ sovereignty.
He cast Trump’s comments as proof that his close relationship with the US president — criticised by political opponents as overly deferential — was paying dividends.
In response, Defence Secretary Wes Streeting has said Britain’s commitment to the Falkland Islands is “absolute and unshakeable”.
In a nationally televised speech on Thursday, Milei said: “The United States is considering this change in position because it knows that Argentina has a reliable partner, aligned with Western values, in a strategically important position that can be a valuable ally in the decades to come.”
The Argentine leader announced sweeping actions aimed at stopping the development of the deep-sea Sea Lion oil project, about 220 kilometers (140 miles) north of the islands, where British company Rockhopper Exploration and Israel’s Navitas Petroleum plan to begin drilling in the coming months and start pumping oil in 2028.
Argentina considers the project an illegal exploitation of resources in waters it claims as its own.
He threatened tougher sanctions against companies involved in the offshore drilling and announced new funding for a naval base in Argentina’s southernmost province of Tierra del Fuego to bolster the country’s military presence near the islands, known in Argentina as the Malvinas.
“Argentina will not stand idly by,” Milei said. “Any further advance on the Malvinas Islands will be considered a violation of our national security.”
Milei has faced criticism at home for warming ties with Britain and professing admiration for Margaret Thatcher, the British prime minister who led the campaign to retake the archipelago during the 1982 Falklands War.
The two-month conflict killed 649 Argentine troops, 255 British service members and three islanders.
The sovereignty claim is enshrined in Argentina’s constitution and frequently invoked as an expression of national identity, from banknotes to World Cup football chants.
It is also one of the few causes that cuts across the country’s stark political divides, giving Milei, who is up for reelection next year, a welcome political opening as his approval ratings slip.
“We can argue about my style. We can disagree over fiscal or exchange-rate policy,” Milei said. “But there are causes that rise above any political difference. The Malvinas is one of them.”
Argentina maintains that it inherited sovereignty over the islands from its former coloniser, Spain, and that Britain has illegally occupied them since 1833.
Britain rejects that claim, citing the islanders’ desire to remain a British overseas territory.
Posting on X on Friday, Mr Streeting said: “Milei’s statement overnight tells us more about domestic politics in Argentina than it does about the Falkland Islands.
“The Falklands are British because Falkland Islanders choose to be British. Our commitment to the Falklands is absolute and unshakeable.”
For decades, successive US administrations have remained neutral on the competing claims while recognising Britain’s de facto administration of the islands.
Any departure from that position would be a major diplomatic affront and inflame already high trans-Atlantic tensions.
On Monday, Trump stirred concern in Britain when asked whether his administration was reviewing its stance on the decades-old dispute. “I always review every position,” he replied. “That’s just one of many.”
In an interview aired on Thursday with GB News, Trump dodged directly answering a question about whether the US would “come to the aid” of Britain in another conflict over the Falklands.
Instead, he repeated past complaints that Britain had not provided sufficient support for the US-led bombing campaign against Iran.
“Your country was not there to help me,” Trump said, recalling Starmer telling him the country did not have ships to contribute to the campaign. “It was pretty sad, the whole thing.”
The Trump administration has floated the Falklands as leverage before: An internal Pentagon email leaked in April first raised the prospect of Washington reconsidering its position on the islands as one possible way to punish NATO allies that declined to join the US war on Iran.
His comments forced Downing Street to insist that Britain would not yield sovereignty over the Falklands.
“Sovereignty rests with the UK, and the islanders’ right to self-determination is paramount,” Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s spokesman, Tom Wells, said earlier this week.
He pointed to a 2013 referendum in which the roughly 4,000 people living in the Falkland Islands voted overwhelmingly in favor of remaining a British overseas territory.
Follow STV News on WhatsApp
Scan the QR code on your mobile device for all the latest news from around the country
