Guyana-Venezuela Border Issue Should Be Peacefully Resolved: MEA

The Union ministry of external affairs said that the border dispute between Guyana and Venezuela should be resolved peacefully and escalatory steps must be avoided. It said that it is closely following the developments pertaining to the border issue.

“We are aware that the matter is already being considered by the International Court of Justice. We welcome the recent regional diplomatic initiatives on the issue,” the external affairs ministry said in an official release.

Venezuela and Guyana have been embroiled in a decades-long dispute over the oil-rich Essequibo region. Guyana has administered Essequibo, which makes up more than two-thirds of its territory, for more than a century.

The issue came to the forefront once again after Venezuela’s strongman President Nicolas Maduro ordered the nation’s state-owned companies to immediately begin exploring and exploiting the oil, gas and mines in Guyana’s Essequibo region and also held a plebiscite asking Venezuelans if his government should lay claim to the area.

Maduro’s attention to the region went when ExxonMobil discovered oil in commercial quantities in 2015. The reserves gave Guyana — population 800,000 — the world’s biggest crude reserves per capita.

Guyana has denounced the referendum as pretext to annex the land and has asked the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to intervene after Maduro said he plans to “build an airstrip to serve as a logistical support point for the integral development of the Essequibo”.

The comment from the Union ministry of external affairs of India comes days before Maduro meets Guyana President Irfaan Ali in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Both leaders are scheduled to meet on Thursday.

The UN also discussed the issue at a closed-door meeting Friday, which is also the subject of litigation before the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

The ICJ ordered Venezuela not to take any action that would alter Guyana’s control over a disputed territory but also did not bar it from holding the referendum which international observers have called a ‘sham’.

The US has also urged all stakeholders to exercise restraint but appeared to back Guyana as it said that its military will carry out joint training flights with Guyana, dubbing the drill as a “routine engagement”.