Heads clear on illegal drugs, guns, crime fight

CARICOM heads made it clear to President George Bush that the trafficking of drugs and guns are of equal importance as his pet subject: terrorism. Their position was reflected in the 17-point joint statement issued at the end of the meeting.{{more}}

“We acknowledge the multidimensional nature of the security threats and challenges faced by our countries and pledge to continue to work together in the fight against terrorism, trafficking in persons, drugs and small arms, and transnational crime,” the joint statement, which the both sides signed following their two-hour summit last week states.

Reporting on the Summit and overall conference to the local media last Monday, Dr Gonsalves said that all the guns that come to the Caribbean, come from the United States, which makes it one of the crucial areas that CARICOM and the United States has to partner on.

“We don’t make guns in the Caribbean and they don’t make them also, to the best of my knowledge in certain of the South American countries. You can trace the small arms really out of the United States,” Dr Gonsalves said.

More mature partnership

Dr Gonsalves, who in his capacity as CARICOM Chairman led most of the discussions including those with incoming World Bank president Robert Zoellick and with the members of the Congressional Black Caucus rated the meetings a great success and said that the purpose of the conference was to build a more mature partnership with the United States.

He said that high on the President Bush’s agenda as he addressed in his opening statement, were issues of Free trade, energy and bio-fuels, matters of human development and the matter of Cuba and Venezuela and the influence they are having in the Western Hemisphere.

He noted that the United States of America accepted the Caricom Single Market as crucial to the region’s development and while they were not able to get any definite pledge, the CARICOM delegation pushed the US government on having them contribute to Caricom Regional Development Fund (CRDF), instituted to assist smaller, developing CARICOM states that will be adversely affected by the single economy.

Fight against HIV/AIDS

As regards the fight against HIV/AIDS, Dr Gonsalves said that CARICOM leaders made the case to have the US$30 billion President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (PEPFAR) extended towards other CARICOM countries in addition to Haiti and Guyana which can now access these funds, a request that President Bush said that he would give favourable consideration.

This was one of the issues highlighted in the official 17-paragraph joint statement between the Caricom and the United States president following their summit.

Dr Gonsalves said that he told President Bush that the matter of disaster preparedness, mitigation and recovery, addressed in paragraph 12 of the joint statement is of great importance to the region.

“The Caricom region and certainly St Vincent and the Grenadines are among one of the most vulnerable countries in the world to natural disasters,” Dr Gonsalves said.

Risk insurance

With the World Bank and Caricom’s Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility in place, Dr Gonsalves said that while they accept the United States’ generosity on many aspects of disaster preparedness, they indicated to President Bush that the United States assistance in funding this insurance will be appreciated.

Canada with a US$20 million pledge and Japan are among the countries that have already supported the capitalization of the fund.

There was also a call for the United States to share much more information on the criminal deportees to the Caribbean. Dr Gonsalves said that while CARICOM has no control on the deportation of its nationals, the regional heads expressed concern about the high level of criminality some of these deportees bring back to the region.

“Sending ten to 15 persons of advanced criminal skills to a small country like St Vincent and the Grenadines can bring immense havoc,” he said.

Dr Gonsalves led an 11-man delegation to the historic conference including his wife Eloise, Deputy Prime Minister Sir Louis Straker, Ambassador Ellsworth John, Consul General Cosmos Cozier, Honorary Counsel Dr Cardon Gill, Clarence Harry, Nadine Agard from NIPI, Martin Laborde from the Chamber of Commerce, Burns Bonadie and Altasha Anderson. (KJ)