The Foreign Office of the United Kingdom is checking into a notice from Argentinean authorities who have issued a statement no longer welcoming a 60-foot Falkland registered yacht Golden Fleece. In effect the yacht was told that British registry in the Falkland Islands, South Sandwich Islands and South Georgia was no longer being recognized. The statement from the Argentine Coast Guard stated the yacht?s entry to the region is considered an exception and as an act of courtesy in accordance to Argentina?s sovereign rights over the region. There are fears that the episode could undermine relations between the two countries, which last year signed an agreement allowing people to enter the islands with Argentine passports for the first time since the Falklands War in 1982.

In the past the skipper of the vessel, Jerome Poncet, has not experienced problems arriving in the Argentine port of Ushuaia, even though the name of the Falklands capital, Port Stanley, is clearly displayed on the stern. Mr. Poncet made the trip to Argentina to pick up a French television crew who had planned to film whales off of Antarctica, and now will not be able to drop them off at the end of the trip.

The incident comes only a month after Fernando De La Rua, who is known to take a harder line than his predecessor over the islands, became president of Argentina. If the ban were applied to all Falklands-registered vessels - which fly the British Red Ensign - it would also affect ships of the British Antarctic Survey.