Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

This coun­try is among the Eu­ro­pean Union and 18 Latin Amer­i­can and Caribbean (LAC) states that have launched the EU–Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean Al­liance for Cit­i­zen Se­cu­ri­ty, aimed at strength­en­ing co-op­er­a­tion on cit­i­zen se­cu­ri­ty be­tween the EU and LAC coun­tries.

This was among the out­comes of the fourth Eu­ro­pean Union and the Com­mu­ni­ty of Latin Amer­i­can and Caribbean States (CELAC) sum­mit, which con­clud­ed yes­ter­day. Events at the sum­mit in­clud­ed Venezue­lan Pres­i­dent Nicolás Maduro is­su­ing a let­ter to CELAC mem­ber states urg­ing them to re­ject the “US-led mil­i­ta­riza­tion of the Caribbean.”

The sum­mit was held in Colom­bia from last Sat­ur­day to yes­ter­day (Mon­day). It was co-chaired by the Pres­i­dent of the Eu­ro­pean Coun­cil, An­tónio Cos­ta, and Colom­bia's Pres­i­dent, Gus­ta­vo Petro.

Cari­com at­ten­dees in­clud­ed Grena­da Prime Min­is­ter Dick­on Mitchell, St Kitts Prime Min­is­ter Ter­rence Drew, and oth­ers. The Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) stat­ed on Face­book that Trinidad and To­ba­go was rep­re­sent­ed by Par­lia­men­tary Sec­re­tary in the Min­istry of For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­istry Nicholas Mor­ris. He called for greater in­ter­na­tion­al col­lab­o­ra­tion to com­bat nar­co-traf­fick­ing and transna­tion­al crime, say­ing these is­sues have erod­ed peace and se­cu­ri­ty in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Speak­ing at the IV CELAC-EU Sum­mit in San­ta Mar­ta, Colom­bia, Mor­ris said the coun­try no longer ex­ists in a “zone of peace” be­cause of the se­ri­ous im­pact of drug and hu­man traf­fick­ing across the re­gion. He told del­e­gates that while Trinidad and To­ba­go val­ues peace as a “supreme as­set,” its re­al­i­ty over the past two decades has been shaped by or­gan­ised crime and its so­cial and eco­nom­ic con­se­quences.

Mor­ris al­so urged re­form of the in­ter­na­tion­al fi­nan­cial sys­tem, say­ing the rules dis­ad­van­tage vul­ner­a­ble states such as Small Is­land De­vel­op­ing States (SIDS), which face the com­bined pres­sures of cli­mate change, eco­nom­ic in­sta­bil­i­ty, and lim­it­ed ac­cess to fi­nance. He said these dis­par­i­ties “must be ur­gent­ly ad­dressed” to en­sure fair­ness and in­clu­sion for de­vel­op­ing na­tions.

He al­so ex­pressed sol­i­dar­i­ty with Cari­com na­tions af­fect­ed by Hur­ri­cane Melis­sa, in­clud­ing Ja­maica and Haiti, as well as Cu­ba.

Ac­cord­ing to a Eu­ro­pean Union press state­ment, with­in the frame­work of the sum­mit, the EU and 18 Latin Amer­i­can and Caribbean states (Colom­bia, Bar­ba­dos, Be­lize, Brazil, Chile, Cos­ta Ri­ca, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, Ecuador, Grena­da, Guatemala, Hon­duras, Ja­maica, Mex­i­co, Pana­ma, Paraguay, Pe­ru, Trinidad and To­ba­go, Uruguay) launched the EU–Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean Al­liance for Cit­i­zen Se­cu­ri­ty. This ini­tia­tive aims to strength­en co­op­er­a­tion on cit­i­zen se­cu­ri­ty be­tween the Eu­ro­pean Union and Latin Amer­i­can and Caribbean coun­tries.

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives reaf­firmed their de­ter­mi­na­tion to in­crease bi-re­gion­al ef­forts to ad­dress com­mon cit­i­zen se­cu­ri­ty chal­lenges and to strength­en the rule of law.

Al­so stressed was the shared pri­or­i­ty of en­hanc­ing co­op­er­a­tion in dis­man­tling transna­tion­al crim­i­nal net­works. This per­tains to il­lic­it traf­fick­ing of drugs, firearms, am­mu­ni­tion, and ex­plo­sives; hu­man traf­fick­ing; cy­ber­crime; smug­gling of mi­grants; il­le­gal min­ing; crimes af­fect­ing the en­vi­ron­ment; il­lic­it traf­fick­ing of cul­tur­al prop­er­ty; and fi­nan­cial crimes.

Trinidad and To­ba­go was al­so list­ed among the EU and 15 Latin Amer­i­can and Caribbean coun­tries (Colom­bia, Bar­ba­dos, Be­lize, Brazil, Chile, Cos­ta Ri­ca, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, Ecuador, El Sal­vador, Grena­da, Guatemala, Hon­duras, Mex­i­co, Paraguay, and Uruguay) that launched a bi-re­gion­al Pact on Care. This pact is de­scribed as seek­ing to fa­cil­i­tate "reg­u­lar ex­changes on progress and best prac­tices in the care econ­o­my, in­clud­ing poli­cies, pro­grammes, ser­vices, reg­u­la­to­ry frame­works, and in­sti­tu­tion­al struc­tures."

Among oth­er out­comes, the EU and CELAC is­sued a joint de­c­la­ra­tion propos­ing deep­er co­op­er­a­tion in re­new­able en­er­gy, food se­cu­ri­ty, tech­no­log­i­cal in­no­va­tion, cul­tur­al ex­changes, and oth­er fields. They reaf­firmed ad­her­ence to the prin­ci­ples and pur­pos­es of the Char­ter of the Unit­ed Na­tions, es­pe­cial­ly the sov­er­eign equal­i­ty of states, re­spect for ter­ri­to­r­i­al in­tegri­ty and po­lit­i­cal in­de­pen­dence, non-in­ter­fer­ence in the in­ter­nal af­fairs of oth­er coun­tries, and the peace­ful set­tle­ment of dis­putes.

"We re­it­er­ate our op­po­si­tion to the threat or use of force and stress the im­por­tance of pri­ori­tis­ing con­flict pre­ven­tion, peace­keep­ing, and peace­build­ing as es­sen­tial el­e­ments for last­ing peace in both re­gions," stat­ed the EU–CELAC de­c­la­ra­tion.

Lead­ers not­ed with con­cern the ad­verse im­pact of the in­creas­ing num­ber of wars and con­flicts around the world and ex­pressed the need to en­sure the pro­tec­tion of civil­ians and the pro­vi­sion of hu­man­i­tar­i­an as­sis­tance.

Re­gion must be a Zone of Peace – Lu­la

The con­fer­ence took place amid re­cent US–Venezuela ten­sions. Sum­mit host Pres­i­dent Petro paid trib­ute to Ale­jan­dro Car­ran­za, one of the vic­tims of US at­tacks, which he de­scribed as ex­tra­ju­di­cial ex­e­cu­tions. Petro al­so not­ed that gov­ern­ments have dif­fer­ent po­si­tions on the mat­ter.

Venezue­lan Pres­i­dent Maduro's let­ter to the heads of CELAC mem­ber states cit­ed the re­cent de­struc­tion of ves­sels at sea, which was con­demned by the UN. He called for an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the "ex­e­cu­tions" and not­ed the de­ploy­ment of US mil­i­tary forces near Venezuela's coastal bor­ders. Maduro urged all coun­tries to unite in a sin­gle voice against at­tacks and mil­i­tary threats and to de­mand their im­me­di­ate ces­sa­tion.

Maduro's mes­sage stressed the need for "re­gion­al mech­a­nisms for hu­man­i­tar­i­an co­op­er­a­tion and col­lec­tive de­fence to pro­tect ter­ri­to­r­i­al sov­er­eign­ty." He de­clared that Latin Amer­i­ca "must pre­serve its will, strength, and au­ton­o­my."

Ac­cord­ing to re­ports, Brazil­ian Pres­i­dent Luiz In­á­cio Lu­la da Sil­va al­so con­demned mil­i­tary de­ploy­ments in the re­gion and at­tacks on civil­ian ves­sels. “We are a re­gion of peace and wish to re­main so. Democ­ra­cies do not fight crime by vi­o­lat­ing in­ter­na­tion­al law,” Lu­la said, ex­press­ing con­cern that re­cent events could un­der­mine re­gion­al sta­bil­i­ty and call­ing for Latin Amer­i­ca to re­main a zone of peace.

Cu­ba's Vice Pres­i­dent Sal­vador Valdés Mesa echoed these con­cerns. Sev­er­al top Eu­ro­pean lead­ers did not at­tend the meet­ing, in­clud­ing French Pres­i­dent Em­manuel Macron, Ger­man Chan­cel­lor Friedrich Merz, and Eu­ro­pean Com­mis­sion Pres­i­dent Ur­su­la von der Leyen. Some cit­ed "con­flict­ing sched­ules," while there has al­so been spec­u­la­tion about a rift be­tween sum­mit host Petro and US Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump.