Min­is­ter of For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Sean Sobers says he has been in con­stant con­tact with Venezue­lan Am­bas­sador Al­varo Sanchez Cordero as ten­sions be­tween the Unit­ed States and Venezuela es­ca­late.

Sobers said there is no am­bas­sador cur­rent­ly sta­tioned in Venezuela, and the coun­try’s diplo­mat­ic rep­re­sen­ta­tion there re­mains lim­it­ed to three diplo­mats, and eight Trinidad and To­ba­go na­tion­als are present­ly in Venezuela on be­half of the Gov­ern­ment.

On the top­ic of an am­bas­sador for Venezuela, he said it is one of sev­er­al coun­tries that do not have a T&T am­bas­sador. The min­is­ter con­firmed that Deb­o­rah Thomas-Fe­lix, for­mer In­dus­tri­al Court pres­i­dent, will be ap­point­ed as High Com­mis­sion­er to Ja­maica next week. He al­so said oth­er ap­point­ments will soon be an­nounced.

He al­so re­newed a call for rel­a­tives of the miss­ing per­sons sus­pect­ed of be­ing killed in a Unit­ed States air strike on a Venezue­lan ves­sel to con­tact the au­thor­i­ties and file a miss­ing per­sons.