US President Joseph Biden picked up the message several leaders sent him and is said to be considering a possible U-turn on his decision not to invite Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua to the June 6-10 Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles, California.
The European Union and a group of Latin American governments that have kept a moderate line on Venezuela called on Thursday for democratic and fresh elections, during a meeting held in Montevideo. The EU-backed International Contact Group on Venezuela said overly forceful intervention could aggravate the crisis.
Montevideo, the capital of “neutral/neutralized” Uruguay is hosting this Thursday an international gathering with countries of the Americas and the European Union to address, and attempt to solve or find a way out to the delicate and worsening situation in Venezuela.
Venezuela’s foreign ministry on Tuesday described as “interventionist and disrespectful” U.S. comments on a weekend incident in which the country’s navy stopped two ships exploring for oil for Exxon Mobil off Guyana’s coast.
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) signed in Guyana, this week, agreements that will see countries of the eastern and southern Caribbean benefiting from US$165 million in development assistance.
Jamaica's Ministry of Health is urging people to be more vigilant and to clean up their environment and destroy mosquito breeding sites, in light of the announcement by the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) that the Zika virus has been detected in a Caribbean Community (CARICOM) nation.
Caribbean Community and Common Market (CARICOM) Foreign Ministers have welcomed Venezuela’s decision to receive a United Nations (UN) technical team which will provide recommendations to the UN Secretary-General on the way forward to a full and final solution to its territorial dispute with Guyana. And they say they fully support Guyana’s “territorial integrity”.
Prime Minister David Cameron has ruled out making reparations for Britain's role in the historic slave trade and urged Caribbean countries to move on. Cameron acknowledged that these wounds run very deep during his visit to Jamaica, where he faced calls to apologize from campaigners.
Venezuela’s vice-president Jorge Arreaza recently heard directly from CARICOM chairman, Barbados’ Prime Minister Freundel Stuart, that the regional grouping is backing Guyana in the territorial dispute between the two South American neighbors. Stuart met last Friday with Arreaza who was visiting the island as part of a regional tour to discuss Venezuela’s territorial and maritime claims in the region.
The Caribbean Community, Caricom is considering a proposal for the region to pursue gradual write-off of its multilateral debt as a means of economic prosperity. The debt relief strategy was put forward by Alicia Barcena from the Economic Commission of Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), at the 36th Regular Meeting of the Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community, held in Barbados.