Career diplomat Cheryl Miles is currently taking steps to take up her post as Guyana ambassador to Venezuela, according to Minister of Governance Raphael Trotman who said yesterday that this should move faster after the UN concludes its current discussions with Caracas over the simmering border controversy between the two countries.
A UN team headed by Chef de Cabinet of the Office of the Secretary General of the United Nations, Susana Malcorra is currently in Caracas where it is engaged in discussions on the controversy resulting from Venezuela’s challenge to the validity of the 1899 Arbitral Award settling the Guyana/ Venezuela border. The six-member team had held discussions with the Guyana Government on Monday.
Speaking at a post-cabinet press briefing yesterday, Trotman told reporters that it is not a matter of if but rather when Miles will wing off to Venezuela.
He said that “preparations are in train for her to move her belongings to Venezuela”. He said that it is expected that when the UN team returns from Caracas “things will move a little faster”.
He said that it is important to note that though Venezuelan ambassador Reina Margarita Arratia Díaz was not physically in Georgetown, “she was not recalled (by Caracas), she was invited home for talks…” He noted that the Venezuela flag is still flying at the official residence of Diaz here in Guyana. This, he said is a “strong sign that the ambassador in a sense is still in residence, not physically there but the presence was still acknowledged”.
Following a September 28th meeting called by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in New York, both the Guyana and Venezuelan presidents agreed to receive their respective ambassadors with Venezuela also accepting an investigative UN team which afterwards will report to the UN Secretary General for a decision on the way forward.
Meanwhile, Trotman said that President David Granger at the Cabinet meeting on Tuesday gave an update on Monday’s engagement with the UN team.
Trotman stated that the all-day meeting saw the government and the parliamentary opposition being represented. He said that government is pleased with the progress made during the discussions. “We put out our very just case why the 1899 arbitral award is final and why our position is a just one”, he said.
Newly-accredited US Ambassador to Guyana Perry Holloway recently urged that the Arbitral Award of 1899 settling the Guyana/Venezuela boundary be respected and he stressed that peaceful means consistent with international law should be used to settle the ongoing controversy between the two countries.
The relationship between the two countries has been deteriorating since May, when Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro issued a decree laying claim to most of Guyana’s territorial waters along the Essequibo Coast. That Decree was subsequently withdrawn and replaced with a new one that was still offensive. The initial decree was issued after United States-based oil company Exxon Mobil announced that it had discovered significant evidence of oil in the Stabroek Block offshore Demerara.
Guyana is insisting that the controversy be settled juridically, while Venezuela wants the Good Offices process to continue.
