Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many times his Department has recorded the incursion of (a) Spanish and (b) civilian and other vessels in Gibraltarian waters in 2023 to date.

Between 1 January and 16 October 2023, there were 382 incursions by Spanish Government Agency vessels into British Gibraltar Territorial Waters (BGTW), breaching the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) Article 19. There were no incursions into BGTW by non-Spanish Government Agency vessels in this period. Entries into BGTW by civilian or commercial vessels are not subject to UNCLOS within BGTW, and are therefore not defined as incursions.