Guyanese President Irfaan Ali reaffirmed Thursday, during the crisis meeting with his Venezuelan counterpart Nicolas Maduro about the territorial dispute around the Essequibo, that his country had “every right” to exploit its “sovereign space”.
The objective of this meeting on the Caribbean archipelago of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, rotating president of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), was to reduce tension. The two heads of state exchanged handshakes at the start and end of a first two-hour meeting.
Tension has been rising since the launch of oil tenders by Guyana in September, then the referendum organized in response on December 3 in Venezuela on the annexation of the Essequibo, a territory of 160,000 km2 rich in oil and natural resources, administered by Georgetown and claimed by Caracas.
“Guyana has every right […] to facilitate any investment, any partnership […]to issue any license, to grant any concession in our sovereign space,” President Ali told the press.
“Guyana is not the aggressor, Guyana is not seeking war, but Guyana reserves the right to work with all its partners to ensure the defense of our country. All our partnerships are based on the defense of our territorial integrity and our sovereignty,” he also said, while Caracas has repeatedly accused Guyana of being at the orders of the United States and the oil company. ExxonMobil.
The Guyanese president also repeated his leitmotif since the start of the crisis: “The matter must be settled before the International Court of Justice” (ICJ) in The Hague, the highest court of the UN.
President Maduro did not speak immediately but he said upon his arrival: “I came to seek effective solutions through the only path that exists, that of dialogue and negotiation.”
“I come with a mandate from the Venezuelan people, with a word of dialogue, with a word of peace, but to defend our rights,” he added.
Caracas does not recognize the jurisdiction of the ICJ. This non-recognition was one of the five questions that the government included in the referendum. More than 95% of Venezuelans, according to disputed voting results, supported this position.
“Defuse tensions”
Several observers believe that the meeting, organized under the aegis of CELAC and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), should not lead to major decisions.
Sadio Garavini di Turno, former Venezuelan ambassador to Guyana, told AFP he expected at best a joint statement in which the two parties would commit to “continue discussions to defuse tensions”.
Venezuela maintains that the Essequibo River should be the natural border, as in 1777 during the time of the Spanish Empire. Caracas believes that the Geneva agreement signed in 1966 — before Guyana’s independence — lays the foundations for a negotiated settlement that must continue.
Guyana believes that the border between the two countries dates from the English colonial era and that it was ratified in 1899 by a Court of Arbitration in Paris. It is this border which is in force.
Some 125,000 people, or a fifth of Guyana’s population, live in this territory covering two-thirds of its surface area.
On Monday, the Venezuelan Minister of Foreign Affairs, Yvan Gil, spoke of possible “formulas” of “cooperation in oil and gas” and stressed that Venezuela worked “with all the governments of Guyana until 2015” , the year of the discovery by the American giant ExxonMobil of vast oil deposits in the territory.
Brazil strengthened its military presence on its borders with the two countries and urged Mr Maduro on Saturday to refrain from “unilateral measures”. Celso Amorim, an advisor to Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, attended the meeting.
The United States affirmed its “unwavering support for Guyana’s sovereignty.” Aerial exercises were conducted last week. Mr. Maduro said he also hoped to discuss “threats” linked to “the involvement of the United States Southern Command, which has begun its operations in the territory”.