GEORGETOWN, Guyana, CMC -Guyana Monday reiterated its objections to claims by Venezuela to establish a Venezuelan state of Guyana Essequibo and an accelerated plan for giving Venezuelan citizenship and identity cards to the Guyanese population, saying “the history and the facts” regarding the border dispute are “overwhelming.”
Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Minister Hugh Todd, tabling a motion in the 65-member National Assembly on the border dispute, said the presence of the lawmakers is to send a message to Caracas that “we are here today as a nation united.
”Mr. Speaker, the history and the facts are overwhelming. But I have to continue, Mr. Speaker because we have to give the people of Guyana a fulsome understanding of this long-standing controversy, which Guyana intends to see through to its logical conclusion in the ICJ (International Court of Justice).”
Todd, holding up a map showing the disputed border, said Venezuela had benefited from the Orinoco when it attained 700 05,640 square kilometers or 358 841 square miles from the award reached “more than four times the size of Guyana.
“This is what they got in the award. Guyana has 83,000 square miles…Mr. Speaker, the facts are here. Venezuela was content with what they wanted because they felt if they got the Orinoco, it would be satisfactory for them. It was a victory.
“They got all that they had bargained for. Therefore, in the contemporary political economy, it is unbelievable and inconceivable that Venezuela would want to try to fool the rest of the world that it has legitimate rights to Guyana’s territory.
“This will not stand, Mr. Speaker. We live in a world where every nation-state must respect laws and rules. However, like the proverbial magic wand, Venezuela sought and still seeks to unilaterally sweep away the reality of the award and our conscious acts consistent with its rulings by seeking to impugn the credibility of the members of the tribunal, eminent and respected jurists of their time,”.
According to the motion released by the National Assembly on Sunday, lawmakers are being asked to provide “support for the government and people of the Cooperative Republic of Guyana and Reaffirm recognition of the 1989 Arbitral Award and the 1966 Geneva Agreement.
“Whereas the Arbitral Award of an Arbitral Tribunal constituted under the Treaty of Arbitration signed in Washington on 2 February 1897, determined the boundary line between the Colony of British Guiana and the United States of Venezuela in 1899;”
Todd told legislators, “We, the people of Guyana, we are very convinced that those attorneys who sat on the tribunal did their best to ensure that they uphold decency, their character intact to ensure that they did the best in the interest of both then British Guiana and Venezuela and we are sure…that the International Court of Justice will prevail, the world will stand with Guyana and the people of Guyana”.
Todd said that no evidence has even been found to support Venezuela’s claim as had been laid out by a “young attorney” who had brought the issue about the border to light and who had demanded that the matter be dealt with six months after his death.
“This is unfounded. This should not be accepted by any right-thinking member of society or any society the world over,” Todd told lawmakers.
He said Guyana has always asked successive governments in Caracas to provide answers to three questions, namely “prove the basis of the contention that the award of 1899 is null and void; identify any provision in the Geneva agreement that says Guyana is precluded from developing the Essequibo and three, place the articles in that agreement that says that the award of 1899 superseded by the Geneva agreement.
“Mr. Speaker, Venezuela has never been able to do so, and they will never be able to do so because they are on the wrong side of history,” Todd said, adding that instead, Venezuela is expanding its claim of nullity of the 1899 award ‘to claim the entire Essequibo region…and even further afield.”.” have resorted to acts of open military aggression…”
The debate in the National Assembly follows meetings between President Irfaan Ali and Opposition Leader Aubrey Norton as well as by the bipartisan parliamentary committee on Foreign Relations.
Guyana has already asked the ICJ to block several questions proposed by Venezuela, seeking a popular vote to support the South American government’s stance of not recognizing the ICJ to settle the decades-old border issue.
Venezuela’s planned referendum and its approved questions for the referendum later this year have set off a wave of criticisms, with the Guyana government accusing Venezuela of trying to annex parts of the country’s territory in contravention of international law.
The 15-member Caribbean Community (CARICOM), the London-based Commonwealth Secretariat, and the Organization of American States (OAS) have also rejected the referendum stating that international law strictly prohibits the Government of one State from unilaterally seizing, annexing, or incorporating the territory of another state and noted that the referendum would open the door to the possible violation of this fundamental tenet of international law.
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