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The case of the galleon 'San José', sunk in the Caribbean three centuries ago, is still open

2022-06-08T10:35:41.666Z


Colombia turns the discovery of the wreck into a media spectacle in the middle of the electoral campaign


As if it were a battle between two enemy fleets, Spain and Colombia maintain a dispute over the ownership of the galleon

San José,

sunk in the Caribbean in 1708 and located by the Swiss treasure hunting society Maritime Archeology Consultans (MAC) in 2015 in Colombian waters.

Spain argues that she is a state ship and, therefore, that she is her property, as would an embassy in foreign territory or a national submarine sunk in the Arctic.

Colombia, which is hers, because she swallowed it in her sea.

Yesterday, the President of the Republic, Iván Duque, proudly showed the latest underwater images of the wreck, confirming that his country fully maintains its expectations of recovering it and not sharing it.

He did not offer information on how the shots have been obtained, at what point is the litigation with MAC, which claims half of a shipment of incalculable value -600 cubic meters of treasure-,

what response has been offered to Spain ―it is a military ship chartered in the time of Felipe V―, with what technology is it intended to be removed from the deep sea, what is the scientific project on which the extraction is based... Nothing.

Only there is a lot of riches and two other wrecks nearby.

More information

Roger Dooley: "You have to control and keep up with the treasure hunters"

But really, who owns this heritage gem laden with tons of gold, silver, and jewels?

The UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage, of 2001, which Colombia refuses to sign, states that the galleon is a World Heritage Site and that both parties must reach an agreement on its extraction, while the United Nations Convention Nations on the Law of the Sea, of 1982, maintains that, as it is a State ship, Spain is its true owner.

This was, for example, the argument that allowed the Kingdom of Spain to recover, in the courts of the United States, the cargo of the frigate

Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes

,

which was looted by the treasure hunting company Odyssey off the coast of Cádiz in 2007.

It seems incredible that two sovereign and friendly States, with a common history of centuries, do not reach an agreement on the galleon.

Spain has tried, unsuccessfully, to agree with the Colombian authorities on joint extraction.

In 2019, the then Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Josep Borrell, and of Culture, José Guirao, traveled to Bogotá to meet with Vice President Marta Lucía Ramírez and sign an agreement.

Only a document of beautiful but hollow words was signed.

Colombia's argument that it belongs to it because it was found in its territorial waters is too weak.

For the same reason, any ship sunk in the waters of another —including Colombians— would become the property of the nation to which that part of the sea where the tragedy occurs belongs.

As for the ownership of the shipment, the same reasons for claiming it go to Peru (silver from Potosí), China (pottery from the K'han Hsi period), Spain (22 Sevillian cannons made by the Habet family) or Panama, where it was taken. carried out the transfer of merchandise from the Pacific to the Atlantic.

Spain, it has always maintained, does not want the cargo of the

San José

―that of the Spaniards plundering America is left for Hollywood movies―, but rather the infinite historical, scientific and military information that can be extracted from it.

In 1708, there was neither Colombia, nor Venezuela, nor Panama, nor Ecuador, only the Viceroyalty of Peru, which was part of the Hispanic monarchy.

Today's Spain has the necessary technology to bring to light an unparalleled treasure that is stalked by treasure hunters (a single gold coin can sell for thousands of dollars at any auction in the United States), unfortunately Colombia does not.

The wreck of the galleon is a military cemetery, a state ship, an archaeological site, a unique opportunity to further unite two countries with a common history, nothing to do with a populist and publicity move at election time.


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Source: elparis

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