Monday marked the 30th anniversary of the bloody 74-day war between Argentina and Great Britain over the Falkland Islands, known in Argentina as the Malvinas, in the South Atlantic. It was an anniversary that did not go unnoticed in either country, with the islands’ offshore oil reserves largely driving the renewed attention.
Exploratory oil drilling commenced in early 2010 in the waters off the string of islands where sheep have long outnumbered people. Several British oil concerns have spent the past two years drilling to assess the potential in the waters surrounding the islands, with increasing success.
Though relevant for its significance from an energy perspective, the drilling has more notably stoked long-simmering tensions between Buenos Aires and London over British control of the islands, which Argentina continues to claim sovereignty over. And as the drilling activity has ramped up, so has the rhetoric from Buenos Aires.