The first of the Wikileaks cables that mentions Guyana relates a 2005 conversation between President Bharrat Jagdeo and the Colombian President Alvaro Uribe.
The cable reveals that Uribe arrived a few minutes late for a meeting with US Undersecretary for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns, “explaining that he had just finished a telephone call with the president of Guyana, lobbying for Ambassador (Luis Alberto) Moreno’s candidacy for president of the IDB.
The election was the following day and Moreno needed one more country to secure a win in the first round of voting. Uribe was convinced that if voting went into a second round, Brazil and Venezuela would form a coalition on behalf of the Brazilian candidate. U/S Burns said the U.S. was fully behind Moreno and had lobbied extensively as well (reftel).
Uribe stressed that he would do a terrific job at the IDB but it would be extremely difficult to find a suitable replacement for him as ambassador to the U.S. In the middle of the meeting, Uribe took a call from his counterpart from Ecuador who pledged to support Moreno.
President Palacio told Uribe that Chavez had called him earlier in the day asking Ecuador to support the Brazilian candidate.”
Moreno duly became President of the IDB and recently won a new term again with the support of Guyana. The IDB has been the key financier of development projects that the Jagdeo administration has undertaken.
The cable is part of the over 200,000 that hacker Julian Assange has released on his Wikileaks website and to select media houses amid an international uproar over some of the disclosures. Just days after the release Assange was arrested in London in relation to a rape investigation. There are said to be 380 cables that refer to Guyana.
This cable that contains the reference to Jagdeo’s conversation with Uribe is classified and dated July 26, 2005. It was dispatched by the US Embassy in Bogota. It is yet unclear which period the cables that pertain to Guyana cover. The period around 2005 could yield important security insights as the pursuit of convicted drug trafficker Roger Khan by the US was in the air along with concerns over the operation of the phantom gangs.
The detailed cable refers mostly to the domestic Colombia situation and relations between Bogota and Caracas. In two instances, Uribe dismisses Venezuela President Hugo Chavez as a mix of someone with “imperial sentiments, drunk with socialism”. Uribe also told Burns he was resigned to the notion that given the current situation in Venezuela at that time political unrest was inevitable. Uribe and Chavez had testy relations for a very long time over the Colombian FARC guerrillas, US support for the drug war in Colombia and other matters.
Burns and US Ambassador Wllliam B Wood met with Uribe and his ministers of defence and foreign affairs Camilo Ospina and Camilo Reyes respectively.
