CARIBBEAN COMMUNITY Foreign Ministers have endorsed candidatures for a seat on the International Criminal Court (ICC) and re-election of an Assistant Secretary General of the Organisation of American States (OAS).

Guyana-born jurist Dr Duke Pollard, currently one of the seven justices of the Port-of-Spain-based Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ), has been endorsed as a candidate to seek election as a judge of the ICC.

The current Assistant Secretary General of the OAS, Suriname-born diplomat, Albert Ramdin, was given the ‘green light’ to seek re-election in that post of the Washington-based hemispheric organisation.

The unanimous endorsements, which came during last week’s meeting in Kingston, Jamaica of CARICOM’s Foreign Ministers, will be forwarded for expected ratification by Heads of Government when they meet for their regular annual summit in Guyana in July. 

Justice Pollard, a former consultant on international law projects for the United Nations and Director of the CARICOM Legislative Drafting Facility prior to his CCJ appointment, may have to compete with other candidates of the Latin America region.

Trinidad and Tobago’s former Attorney General, Karl Hudson-Phillips, was the first candidate of the Caribbean/Latin America region to be elected as a judge of the ICC which he served for four years before opting to resign for personal reasons.

The ICC was inaugurated in The Hague in March 2003 with the United States of America, under then President George Bush administration refusing to sign the treaty for membership access. This development is now likely to occur under President Barrack Obama’s administration. 

Ambassador Ramdin, a former Assistant Secretary General of  CARICOM with responsibilities for Foreign and Community Relations, had served for three years as Special Adviser to ex-OAS Secretary General, Cesar Gaviria, before seeking the office he has now been holding since 2005. 

The offices of both OAS incumbents–Secretary General, Jose Miguel Insulza, Chile’s former Foreign Minister, and Assistant Secretary General Ramdin, are due for election at the organisation’s General Assembly in June 2010.

Their respective campaigns will initially begin following next month’s OAS General Assembly in Honduras.