…Min. Greenidge tells Brooklyn conference

PRESIDENT David Granger has reiterated his Government’s commitment to the course of action outlined by former United Nations (UN) Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, regarding the Guyana-Venezuela controversy when he met the incumbent Secretary-General, António Guterres on Monday.

According to the Ministry of the Presidency, the President, on Tuesday, said that the engagement with Guterres offered an opportunity to seek clarification and to be updated on the progress that has been made thus far. “Monday’s meeting was largely what you will call a situational report and a commitment on the part of Guyana to remain engaged…We will continue to exchange views with the intention of bringing this matter to a successful closure,” President Granger said.

At a separate forum on Tuesday, 2nd Vice President and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Carl Greenidge, who accompanied President Granger to the high-level meeting, assured that Guyana would come out victorious in the event that the Guyana-Venezuela border controversy is referred to the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

“We are quite sure that it is a matter that can be defended and won in Court,” the Foreign Affairs Minister said, during an interactive session at the Medgar Evers College, in Brooklyn, on Tuesday. Minister Greenidge was, at the time, presenting on the Guyana-Venezuela border controversy and its negative impacts on Guyana, following an invitation by Dean Terrence Blackman.

It was Attorney-at-law, Colin Moore, who had questioned the Foreign Minister on the commitment made by the former U.N Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, to refer the controversial matter to the ICJ if significant progress is not made by the end of December 2017, and whether the country had secured Mr. Guterres’ commitment in this regard. For Moore, Guyana will be on its way to victory once the matter is referred to the ICJ.
“I have tremendous faith that if the matter is referred to the ICJ, I have tremendous faith that we will prevail simply because the law is on our side,” Moore said before a room full of students, lecturers and deans.

Like Moore, Minister Greenidge, in his response, said the prospect is high for Guyana. “We are pretty sure that if the Secretary-General refers the matter to the court we stand a better than even chance, a very good chance of winning the decision,” the Foreign Affairs said.

When approached by the Guyana Chronicle Minister Greenidge, speaking briefly on Monday’s high-level meeting with the U.N Secretary-General, said no progress report was given to the Guyanese delegation led by President Granger. “It was not a progress report. We saw the SG, as he would normally see visiting heads, but we did also indicate to him we had some concerns about some aspects of the process, that is what we left with him,” Minister Greenidge told this newspaper.

He noted that the U.N Secretary-General Personal Representative, Dag Halvor Nylander is working with both countries in tandem with the U.N but made it clear that details of his work cannot be disclosed. “He is working with us, he is working with the Venezuelans and he is working with the U.N, there is no way that he is required or he is going to be in a position to report on those other elements because the process requires some degree of confidentiality, so that aspect would have to wait,” the Foreign Affairs Minister explained.

In detailing the history of the controversy, during his presentation at the college, the Foreign Affairs Minister pointed out that during the second half of the 19th century, a dispute broke out between Venezuela and Great Britain over the location of the border between its colony of British Guiana and the Spanish-speaking republic. It continued until an Arbitral Tribunal was empaneled in 1897 to determine the borders and an Arbitral Award was issued on October 3, 1899. Subsequently, a Joint Commission with representatives from both countries delineated the borders in 1905.

For 63 years Guyana and Venezuela had accepted the 1899 Award, until the latter alleged that the Arbitral Award was null and void. In February of 1966, the British and Venezuela signed the Geneva Agreement with the intention of providing Venezuela an opportunity to prove her claim of nullity of the 1899 Arbitral Award. Guyana became a party to that agreement upon attaining independence a few months later.

The Agreement recognised in Article (2) that the issue at hand was …’the task of seeking satisfactory solutions for the practical settlement of the controversy between Venezuela and the United Kingdom, which has arisen as the result of the Venezuelan contention that the Arbitral Award of 1899 about the frontier between British Guiana and Venezuela is null and void.’

In 1989, the matter was referred to the then Secretary General of the United Nations, who chose the Good Offices Process. However, in 2012, after careful consideration, the Government of Guyana had taken the decision to review its options within and consistent with the Geneva Agreement, as it did not appear that Venezuela was willing to meet its obligations under the Process.

Minister Greenidge said since making it claims, Venezuela has been stymieing development in Guyana. “In 2013 Venezuela seized a vessel doing exploration work on the maritime shelf. Anadarko is an American company which does oil exploration, and their vessel was seized – it has never come back to Guyana. It is not a theoretical dispute with no implications, it is a dispute with implications for Guyana because when Guyana Gold Fields started doing gold mining in Guyana…they received a letter from the Venezuelan Government saying ‘you are trespassing and we will take actions against you.

So companies are afraid,” the Foreign Affairs Minister stated.
On December 15, 2016, the then U.N Secretary-General informed both Guyana and Venezuela of his decision under Article IV (2) of the 1966 Geneva Agreement, as to the means of settlement of the controversy between Guyana and Venezuela.

The controversy arose after Venezuelan contended that the Arbitral Award of 1899 about the frontier between British Guiana and Venezuela was null and void. Venezuela’s position remains the same today even as Guyana pushes for a peaceful settlement at the level of the ICJ.

Mr. Ban Ki-moon and Mr. Guterres, in keeping with the tenets of the 1966 Geneva Agreement, had agreed that if by the end of December 2017, significant progress has not been made towards arriving at a full agreement for the settlement of the controversy, the ICJ will be the next means of peaceful settlement, unless Guyana and Venezuela jointly request otherwise.