Georgetown: The Guyana Government has called upon the United Nations (UN) Secretary General (SG) Ban Ki Moon to identify the next steps in the process, to bring matters to an end in light of the surrounding continuous issues with the Guyana/Venezuela border matter.
“The Geneva Agreement of 1966 charges the Secretary General with responsibility, or a mandate, to find a means of resolving this controversy …namely of looking at the menu of options set out under article 33 (of the Geneva Agreement), and to identify the next steps in this process, because the two parties between themselves have not arrived at or cannot find a consensus, as regards going forward,” Minister of Foreign Affairs and second Vice President, Carl Greenidge said today. He was at the time hosting a press conference.
The calls made by the administration, for the intervention of the Secretary General, were responded to, and two UN teams visited both countries, and held dialogue.
“We had extensive discussions, after those discussions, they briefed the president on what had been discussed and the ideas they had and at the end of that exercise, they left… That process, having been triggered and being in train, the UN’s team or the SG is now expected to work up some ideas which they have been developing in the light of the discussions that have taken place,” Minister Greenidge explained.
He added that the ideas and proposals on moving forward and which will be developed by the UN will have to be discussed and agreed to by both Guyana and Venezuela.
Judicial resolution
The administration has expressed the view that only a judicial resolution of the issue would suffice in bringing the matter to a close, as it is of the considered opinion that only a judicial decision can determine where the 1899 award is ‘null and void,’ as claimed by Venezuela.
Minister Greenidge indicated that the Secretary General has acknowledged that any resolution to the problem would involve answering the question whether the award is null and void.
“You would have had a series of processes ending with the appointment of persons as part of a Good Offices process… Guyana says that they have no interest in continuing with the Good Offices processes because it has harmed Guyana. It does not mean that Guyana has indicated that it has rejected or is rejecting the Geneva Agreement,” Greenidge added.
He continued that Guyana is the only party that would have studiously adhered to the Geneva Agreement, evidenced by their conduct of not invading their neighbour, not publishing false press statements about the rights exercised in Venezuela, and would have accommodated the Secretary General when called upon.
“For Guyana it is important at this stage for us to understand what’s involved, what we’re doing and what we’re not doing… we’re satisfied legally that the recommendations we’re making can be implemented without doing violence to the rule of law, rights of Venezuela and certainly without doing violence to our rights ,” Greenidge said.
You must be logged in to post a comment.