Dear Editor,
Recently, there has been a confluence of events impacting our national security that all had a nexus with the Venezuelan regime of Nicolas Maduro. First, there is the heightened activity by the US Naval Force assembled in the Caribbean Sea to interdict narco-smuggling boats from Venezuela with one of its warships, the Destroyer USS Gravely, docking in Port of Spain and a contingent of Marines conducting joint exercises with the T&T armed forces. This precipitated a furious response from the Maduro regime via VP Delcy Rodriguez, who announced, “It is a matter of honour, dignity, morality, expression, sovereignty, and Venezuelan independence to declare this woman, who crawls like a worm, persona non grata to this Republic, which is the cradle of liberators, which is the cradle of free men and women!!” She accused PM Kamla Persad-Bissessar of making T&T a “vassal” of the US and threatened a gas deal with the island. Earlier, Guyana was also placed in Venezuela’s crosshairs for supporting the US naval actions to interdict drugs smuggling.
Then, there was the Caricom statement implicitly criticizing the US naval presence and its violent actions against narco-smuggling boats. It “reaffirmed unequivocal support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of countries in the region and the safety and livelihoods of the people of the region and claimed the actions threatened the principle of maintaining the Caribbean region as a Zone of Peace. It stressed the importance of dialogue and engagement towards the peaceful resolution of disputes and conflict.”
T&T declined to support the statement and said it wholeheartedly supported the US actions because of the effect of drug smuggling and related gang activity in T&T. Persad-Bissessar opined that the latter reality belied the claim of the Caribbean being a “Zone of Peace” and that Caricom has become an unreliable partner so T&T would have to broaden its alliances. She later clarified, however, that there would be no imminent “Trexit” from Caricom. Guyana went along with Caricom’s statement even though we have been the victim of sustained hostilities by Venezuela in its hybrid war to seize our Essequibo. We should have also abstained while enumerating Venezuela’s serial list of hostile actions; including building a bridge and reinforcing its military presence in our half of Ankoko island it seized in 1966. We should be more forthright with our Caricom partners such as St Vincent’s Ralph Gonsalves and other ALBA members who have persistently supported Maduro because of their PetroCaribe interest.
Then there are the actions of the Venezuelan Sindicato gang named “Organisation R” that has persistently attacked our GDF soldiers patrolling the Cuyuni River, our border with Venezuela. Last May, there were three attacks. Organization R is one of several gangs that operate in the “mining arc” that adjoins the Venezuelan side of the Cuyuni and prey on the gold miners there. They work hand-in-glove with Venezuelan military officials who control the cyanide pits that extract the gold from the ore and form an integral link in smuggling some of that gold into Guyana to be further smuggled to foreign markets.
According to a recent report by the very reputable InSight Crime that focuses on Latin America and the Caribbean, “Over the years, the OR also expanded into Essequibo, where it controls illegal gold mines, according to a Bolívar state resident familiar with the gang’s operations who spoke on condition of anonymity.” More insidiously the report claimed, “These criminal groups (the Sindicato gangs) offer a form of deniable force, a tactic the Venezuelan state has utilized in the past.”
And this activity of Venezuelan transnational gangs invokes the fourth event – the terrorist bombing by members of Organization R of a gas station in the heart of Georgetown’s commercial district. The identity of the bomber has been ascertained; and while the motive has not, the activity was clearly meant to create maximum chaos and mayhem. This was shown by the initial attempt to place the bomb in a garbage bin next to a gasolene pump, which would have been connected to the underground gas tank with thousands of gallons of gasolene.
We have now been attacked by a transnational terrorist Non-State Actor (NSA) that is harboured by the Venezuelan State controlled by Maduro. We await Caricom’s statement.