VENEZUELA-GUYANA: Maduro and Ali to meet amid hopes of de-escalation
Thank you for reading LatinNews' chosen article from the Latin American Weekly Report, produced since 1967 - 14 December 2023
Please see today's LatinNews Daily for the latest update: Maduro and Ali agree to avoid military conflict
Nearly two weeks on from a referendum in which Venezuelan voters expressed support for annexing the disputed Essequibo region, tensions between Venezuela and Guyana remain extremely high. But a regional diplomatic effort led by Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva may offer a route to de-escalation; at the time of writing on 14 December, an emergency summit was due to take place between Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro and his Guyanese counterpart, Irfaan Ali.
Brazil’s President Lula has emerged as the leader of a regional push to prevent the escalating tensions over the Essequibo from spiralling into an all-out war between Venezuela and Guyana. Military conflict remains unlikely, amid continued signs that President Maduro is using the issue to whip up support from Venezuelan nationalists ahead of next year’s presidential elections. Nevertheless, from the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 to Argentina’s invasion of the Falkland Islands/Malvinas in 1982, examples abound of wars which up until the last minute had been widely interpreted as aggressive sabre-rattling. Diplomatic efforts are now being ramped up in Latin America to prevent a similar surprise.
Lula spoke with Maduro by telephone on 9 December to “remind him of the long history of dialogue in Latin America and that we are a region of peace,” according to a statement from the Brazilian presidency. That phone call also appears to have led Maduro to agree to a 14 December meeting with President Ali, which will take place on neutral ground in St Vincent and the Grenadines. The Vincentian prime minister, Ralph Gonsalves, said that Lula and the current chairman of the Caribbean Community (Caricom), Dominica’s Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit, have also been invited; the Brazilian press has reported that Lula will send his foreign policy adviser Celso Amorim in his stead.
There is no chance of the Essequibo dispute, which has been running for over 120 years, being harmoniously resolved at the summit. However, a face-to-face meeting between Maduro and Ali would at least allow the possibility for private assurances that could prevent Venezuela’s war of words from turning into a shooting war. In a letter to Gonsalves ahead of the meeting, Ali said that he was attending the summit in light of Caricom’s call for dialogue aimed at de-escalating the situation, and that “we are hoping that there will be a full commitment to peace, respect for our borders, and for peace within the region”.
Crucially, however, Ali was adamant that Guyana’s territorial boundaries would not be up for discussion. This served as a rebuke to Maduro’s claim that the meeting was being held “in order to directly address the territorial dispute between Venezuela and Guyana”. Ali said he would be “prepared to speak with President Maduro on any other aspect that may contribute to improving and strengthening amicable relations”.
Meanwhile, Maduro is continuing to sketch out his vision for how the Essequibo would look under Venezuelan rule. On 12 December he met Venezuelan business leaders who unveiled proposals for various sectors in the Essequibo. Orlando Camacho, the president of the business lobby Fedeindustria, highlighted opportunities in oil, food production, and telecommunications in Venezuela’s “new state” in the Essequibo. Reynaldo Quintero, president of the fossil fuel association Cámara Petrolera de Venezuela (CPV), noted the region’s extensive reserves of fossil fuels and minerals, over which he claimed that?“Venezuela not only has geographic rights, but also political and economic rights”.?
领英推荐
2024 budget
Vice President?Delcy Rodríguez?told legislators on 13 December that, for the first time, the 2024 budget includes resources for?“the defence of Guayana Esequiba” – the government’s name for the Essequibo, which it has declared to be a Venezuelan state. Rodríguez said that the funding assigned to the Essequibo issue would include social, economic, educational, and military spending. The budget, which was approved by the national assembly, outlines 729.95bn bolívares (US$20.51bn) in planned spending.
Please see today's LatinNews Daily for the latest update: Maduro and Ali agree to avoid military conflict
Articles in this issue:
Acting Chief of Staff, Office of National Drug Control Policy, The White House
1 年The irony--after overseeing the deterioration and decline of its own once-thriving oil sector, the illegitimate regime of Maduro pretends to be able to develop a new one from the ground up. Bets, anyone?