–Foreign Secretary says

FOREIGN Secretary Robert Persaud has said that President, Dr Irfaan Ali’s Chairmanship of CARICOM will see more implementations of decisions to foster better regional integration.

Guyana is currently hosting the 46th Regular Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of CARICOM.

Persaud highlighted Guyana’s intention during an interview on the sidelines of the meeting, where he said too that the regional integration movement is about delivering results.

“It makes absolutely no sense for heads to meet from meeting to meeting and not be in a position to implement and make progress in decisions that they have agreed on, and I think lack of implementation breeds frustration and it holds back development,” he said.

Against this backdrop, Persaud added that it is the duty of regional leaders to be much more aggressive in the implementation of decisions and indicated that it is clear that this will be President Ali’s focus.

The Foreign Secretary said that this meeting will, however, be one with a difference, where under the President’s chairmanship there will be vibrancy and results-oriented approaches to tackle the gamut of issues that are before the conference.

Persaud also said that Guyana assuming the chairmanship of CARICOM allows the country to bring new perspectives on pressing global and regional issues, and further move in the direction of bringing about closer trade relations and making CARICOM more meaningful.

He said: “If you listened to the President’s speech yesterday [Sunday] at the opening of the CARICOM heads, he was very specific, he was very clear to what some of his objectives were and he pointed to things that matter to people’s day-to-day lives.”