Dear Editor,
In Sunday Stabroek of November 4, 2012, there appeared an article captioned ‘From Cuffy to Roger Khan: Notes on the trail of espionage in Guyana‘ written by Nigel Westmaas. In that article Mr Westmaas made reference to the formation of the Working People’s Alliance (WPA) in the late 1970s, and the late Dr Walter Rodney.
Mr Westmaas then pointed out that “according to Jamaican intelligence files, he [Dr Rodney] first came to security notice in June 1961, when he and two others accepted an invitation to attend a meeting of the International Union of Students, in Moscow.” Mr Westmaas wrote, “for unknown reasons Rodney did not proceed to Europe but toured the Caribbean.”
For the information of Mr Westmaas and the wider reading public, I the undersigned attended that meeting as a representative of the Progressive Youth Organisation (PYO), which was held in Leningrad (now returned to its former name, St Petersburg) and not in Moscow. Therefore I can vouch for the fact that Dr Rodney attended that meeting and that he was an active participant.
Yours faithfully,
Neville Annibourne