NASSAU, Bahamas, CMC – Foreign ministers from the 15-member regional integration grouping will meet here on Wednesday ahead of the 44th regular meeting of CARICOM leaders. It has been announced.
A CARICOM Secretariat statement said that the Council for Foreign and Community Relations (COFCOR) would be held under the chairmanship of Bahamas Foreign Minister Frederick Mitchell.
Assistant Secretary-General for the Directorate of Foreign and Community Relations, Ambassador Donna Forde, said that the foreign ministers would have engagements with several bilateral and multilateral partners.
They will hold bilateral discussions with representatives from the United States, the Republic of Korea, the United Arab Emirates, and the Republic of Azerbaijan.
The Food and Agriculture Organisations (FAO), the International Office for Migration (IOM), and the European Union (EU) are the multilateral partners with whom the COFCOR will engage.
“Foreign policy is predicated on domestic policy and the areas where we have challenges domestically. We need to build relationships and partners to achieve the kind of outcomes that we want for our people with other global partners. That is why these meetings are so important,” Forde said.
The decisions of COFCOR will be taken forward to the summit for consideration by the regional leaders.
Meanwhile, the need for continued vigilance against the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and the recent threat of Monkey Pox are among the critical issues for discussion by regional leaders.
Assistant Secretary-General (ASG), Directorate of Human and Social Development, Alison Drayton, said challenges to health system resilience, regional health security, climate change, and routine vaccinations are also significant issues for the leaders.
She said that while COVID-19 has persisted for over three years, based on reports from the Trinidad-based Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) and member states, the pandemic is in a phase of less severe disease and death with the spread of mainly the Omicron variants.
However, she emphasized that the continued spread is consistently on the agenda of high-level forums, including the Council for Human and Social Development (COHSOD) and within the CARICOM Secretariat.
“CARPHA has been mandated to lead the response to COVID-19 as early as 2020, and I am pleased to see that the region has benefitted from several public goods as a result of their coordination and leadership,” Drayton said, adding that the regional leaders will also receive updates on the recent challenges experienced by the region regarding health system resilience and regional health security.
“A CARPHA report on this agenda item will be presented to Heads of Government (and) this will illustrate the role of the new Regional Health Security Agenda, as well as measures taken to mitigate health threats and climate change challenges.
“These are among the issues which threaten to disrupt our Region’s pursuit of resilient health systems and regional health security,” Drayton said.
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