Miguel López writes from Buenos Aires: Why is President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner getting so excited about the Falklands – sorry, in her case it’s the Islas Malvinas – all of a sudden? Hasn’t she enough on her plate already, with the economy slowing down and inflation rising. Surely, it’s not the time to get into a hawkish stand-off over a group of islands 300 miles off Argentina’s coast.

Although, it has to be said, and I’ll say it, that Buenos Aires has put out a statement pointing out that it doesn’t want another war with Britain. In plain speak, it means that for the moment at least the Argentinian government prefers a diplomatic war that is so useful when you need to distract your people from domestic problems and inject a bit of patriotism into the mood of the nation. On paper Argentina wants the United Nations to resolve the territorial dispute. But when did the UN last resolve any dispute? Exactly.

Argentina got all excited recently about Prince William coming to the Falklands for a six month mission as a helicopter search and rescue pilot. Then Buenos Aires claimed that a British nuclear powered submarine was roaming in the area. And, finally, serious anger erupted on the Argentinian side when news of a modern British destroyer arriving to patrol the high seas in South Atlantic. All of these development, according to the Argentinian government, amounted to the ‘militarisation’ by the British of the dispute over the islands.

Mind you, Argentina suddenly got a boost from the creative community. Hollywood actor Sean Penn, who was once married to Madonna, the pop singer, has been giving his support to Ms Kirchner. Penn, who likes to get involved in politics even though he doesn’t really understand much about it, is saying that Britain is behaving like a colonial power, refusing to return the islands to Argentina. It’s a good cause for self-publicity, obviously, and ex Mr Madonna knows this. But would it help to increase pressure on Britain? I doubt it, I honestly doubt it.

The reason why the sovereignty of the Falklands is such a hot issue has all to do with oil. And gas. There are huge reserves of both below the ocean bed around the islands. Argentina is obviously keen on getting its hands on all this mineral wealth in the hope of improving its future prospects. Not to mention that it’s a great unity building exercise at a time of hardship.

So what could be the solution? Well, the simple one may include sharing the mineral wealth between the Falklands and Britain, on the one hand, and Argentina on the other. But that doesn’t work like that in the high-powered world of international diplomacy. The whole point of modern diplomacy is to make things much worse before getting down to sorting them out. (Just look at what is going on around Syria if you don’t believe me.) So expect a lot of posturing and meaningless statements for next decade or so, and maybe a bit of shooting, before anyone comes up with some solution.

That what out 21st civilised century is all about. We don’t solve conflicts and disputes lightly.

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