Spain was forced to apologise to Gibraltar after armed maritime officers strayed into the British territory´s waters while in pursuit of smugglers.

Four Spanish Civil Guardsmen were seized on Monday evening after chasing suspected smugglers close to the Rock. Gibraltarian police detained the Spaniards and two suspected smugglers, who grounded their dinghy on rocks near a supermarket inside the port.

It was the second diplomatic incident relating to tensions between Spain and Gibraltar in less than a month.

The Spanish interior minister, Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba, made a prompt call to Gibraltar´s Chief Minister, Peter Caruana, to apologise for the breach and the Spanish officers were released shortly after.

“Mr Rubalcaba called me personally last night,” said Mr Caruana on Tuesday. “He said that they deeply regretted the incident and he apologised.”

The Gibraltar leader said he had been assured that there were “no political intentions” behind the incident, the latest in a series of maritime confrontations between Spanish and British authorities amid escalating tensions ovre maritime territory.

Spain has no legal authority in the waters surrounding the Rockat its south-western tip. Gibraltar was ceded to the British under the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht but Spain has never relinquished its claim of sovereignty and disputes Britain´s jurisdiction of the waters that surround it.

The latest drama comes only weeks after the Royal Navy was accused of using a Spanish flag for target practice during a military exercise in international waters off Gibraltar.

Britain's new ambassador to Spain, Giles Paxman, explained the target had in fact been a Nato flag bearing the same colours as the Spanish flag. But he apologised for the incident.

via Spain apologies after incursion into Gibraltar waters – Telegraph.