US embassy denies espionage report
Talks are underway between the Home Affairs Ministry and Mormons on a settlement to allow church members to continue their work here and the US Embassy yesterday said that it issued no reports saying that the missionaries were expelled from Guyana because of possible espionage activities.
The Ministry of Home Affairs, in a statement issued on Wednesday night just after fifty missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints had been ordered to leave Guyana in 30 days, denied a report which it said purportedly originated from the US embassy that the missionaries were being expelled because “they were engaged in espionage activities”.
The statement had said: “The Ministry of Home Affairs acting in accordance with the Laws of Guyana i.e. the Immigration Act Chap 14:02 issued letters denying Work Permits and Extension of Stay to fifty (50) Missionaries belonging to the said Church. They were ordered to leave the jurisdiction”, the statement said. It added that efforts are being made to determine the whereabouts of 13 others.
In a brief press statement yesterday the US Embassy said it had issued no reports as alleged in the Ministry of Home Affairs statement. “The Embassy’s communications with the Government of Guyana in the case of the U.S. citizen missionaries have been official and diplomatic and, as such, private and privileged. The Embassy has not, and would not, issue or originate reports as indicated”, the US Embassy said of the ministry’s press statement.
Meanwhile, officials of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints have met with a group from the Ministry of Home Affairs. Contacted yesterday afternoon, Colin Goodluck who is the President of the Georgetown, Guyana District of the Church said that he was not in a position to comment.
“The meetings we had yesterday [Thursday],” Goodluck told Stabroek News, “have not yet been concluded and they are continuing this afternoon [yesterday]…as I said, as soon as we have information we will make it available.”
Asked about the church’s activities during the last few years it had spent here and how the current immigration issue will affect the organization’s work locally, Goodluck indicated that he was willing to speak on these issues but at a later date. He then informed this newspaper about the meeting with the Ministry of Home Affairs and directed this newspaper to Leslie Sobers, the church’s Director of Public Affairs, for a comment.
Sobers explained that “three senior officials” of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints, who he declined to name, met with a group at the Ministry of Home Affairs. The group of ministry officials did not include Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee.
“The church officials met with those at the ministry and it has been decided that the Church will continue its humanitarian work in Guyana after this matter is settled,” Sobers said.
Sobers also said that the meeting resulted in certain guidelines, which he is not at liberty to discuss, being set for the church to follow so that such an issue does not arise in the future. He stressed that the church has pledged to continue its humanitarian work here and would not deprive Guyanese of their service.
“We have also asked that certain key members among the group of fifty missionaries asked to leave Guyana be allowed to remain,” Sobers said. “The church was asked to submit a list of those key members and has been promised that work permits will be granted to those persons.”
The Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints has been operating in Guyana for more than two decades. During the last two years, according to Sobers, it has expended more than $422million here in humanitarian services.
During mid September last year, Sobers noted, the church had donated 250 wheelchairs of five different sizes to the Ministry of Health’s Materials Management Unit at Kingston. A Government Information Agency statement had said that the charitable act served to complement the vision of the Health Ministry in ensuring that every Guyanese in need of a wheelchair is provided with one. The average cost a wheelchair then was approximately US$85, including shipping.
According to the Ministry of Home Affairs statement on Wednesday night, the missionaries who expected to leave by the end of September were not granted extensions of stay and some were not in possession of valid work permits. This was denied by the church’s Director of Public Affairs, Sobers, who said that applications were submitted for extension of stays but as far as he knows they were never given responses.
An elderly missionary couple was the first to be picked up from their home by police on Tuesday night. Wednesday morning the rest of their colleagues showed up at the Criminal Investigation Department, Eve Leary and were detained there for about 12 hours.
The US embassy and senior members of the church were forced to intervene and meet with President Bharrat Jagdeo at Office of the President before the missionaries were finally released that day.
