João Gomes Cravinho considers that “the most sensible thing” would be for Portugal to warn the USA in advance that “if they proceed with an attack without the coverage of International Law, then they should not use the Lajes Base”
Former head of diplomacy João Gomes Cravinho defended this Thursday that Portugal reject the North American use of the Lajes Base in a possible unilateral operation, while former minister Martins da Cruz supports the government’s decision to allow such use.
At a time when the Lajes Base, on the island of Terceira, Azores, has registered greater movement of North American aircraft, when the North American president, Donald Trump, increases pressure on Iran, the former socialist Minister of Foreign Affairs and Defense João Gomes Cravinho considers that Portugal must defend International Law and multilateralism.
“The most sensible thing would be a prior warning” to the United States (USA) that “if they proceed with an attack without the coverage of International Law, then they should not use the Lajes Base”, he defended, in statements to the Lusa news agency.
For Gomes Cravinho, the agreement between Portugal and the USA “is very clear” in stipulating that “there is a duty to request authorization and authorization is given by Portugal for purposes other than NATO or the United Nations, as long as Portugal has not objected within the scope of the United Nations”.
The agreement on cooperation and defense between Portugal and the USA, approved in 1995, provides that “any use by the United States of America of the facilities referred to in no. [base militar] that does not arise from or integrate the situations provided for in the previous sections of this article [NATO ou outras organizações internacionais] must be subject to prior authorization”.
“The position of the Portuguese Government is correct. I fully agree with what the Portuguese Government is doing, allowing the Americans to use the Lajes Base in missions outside NATO”, said, in turn, former Minister of Foreign Affairs António Martins da Cruz (2002-2003), during the executive of José Manuel Durão Barroso (PSD/CDS-PP).
“Portugal can give tacit authorization to the United States Government and does not need to give concrete authorization in writing on a case-by-case basis”, he argued.
The Minister of State and Foreign Affairs, Paulo Rangel, admitted this Monday that the United States could use the Lajes Base for a military operation against Iran without notifying Portugal.
The government official invoked the agreement between Portugal and the USA, which provides for “tacit authorizations, which are given within a relatively short period of time”, recognizing that in recent weeks, the use of such authorizations has been “greater than usual”, noting that this has already happened “more than once” since he took office, in April 2024.
Martins da Cruz highlighted to Lusa that, in the context of a possible North American intervention in Iran, the United States is using bases in Spain, Italy, Turkey and “probably the one they have in Greece”.
“None of these countries raised objections and I see no reason for Portugal to raise them either”, considered Martins da Cruz, who was also an ambassador to NATO.
Martins da Cruz considered that “foreign policy has no state of mind and exists to defend Portugal’s interests”.
“The United States, regardless of the administration and the President, are our main ally and our defense and security are based on the United States. And this is what matters in terms of foreign policy”, summarized the former minister of Durão Barroso’s government.
Gomes Cravinho disagreed: “Portugal has a fundamental interest in reducing the process of erosion of International Law and multilateralism that is underway”.
“The Lajes Base is part of this broad framework of our foreign policy in which we have to reconcile the desire to use the base as an instrument of transatlantic rapprochement with our fundamental interest in not eroding International Law”, defended the current special representative of the European Union for the Sahel.
“It is clear that we can say no to an ally, we remain sovereign and we have an agreement that has been negotiated (…). Saying that our only interest is not to bother the United States seems to me to be an absurd reductionism of our foreign policy, which goes far beyond that”, maintained the former minister in the governments of António Costa.
Asked about the use of the base in an operation that could be considered a violation of International Law and in what position Portugal would be in this scenario, Gomes Cravinho summarized: “If Portugal gave explicit authorization for an action that is contrary to International Law, then naturally it is complicit. If Portugal allows the use of the base for an action contrary to International Law by simply closing its eyes and pretending that it has nothing to do with the matter, then at the very least it is negligent.”
Martins da Cruz minimized: “It is in the same situation as Spain, Italy, Turkey and the countries that have US bases and which they authorize the United States to use.”
“I don’t know if there is a violation of International Law. Portugal can give a generic authorization to the United States and is respecting International Law”, he considered, recalling two moments in which Portugal disrespected International Law: in the Balkan conflict, in the 1990s, and in Iraq, in 2003, interventions in the absence of the United Nations Security Council.
Martins da Cruz was Minister of Foreign Affairs when Portugal supported the invasion of Iraq, after a summit, precisely at the Lajes Base, as part of a coalition led by the United States and the United Kingdom, which claimed that Baghdad possessed weapons of mass destruction, which were never found.
