The Amer­i­can Cham­ber of Com­merce of Trinidad and To­ba­go (AM­CHAM T&T) has wel­comed the an­nounce­ment by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad Bisses­sar and Unit­ed States Sec­re­tary of State Mar­co Ru­bio re­gard­ing U.S. sup­port for the Drag­on Gas pro­pos­al.

In a state­ment, AM­CHAM T&T said it is hope­ful that this de­vel­op­ment will re­sult in the grant­i­ng of the rel­e­vant li­cens­es by the Of­fice of For­eign As­sets Con­trol (OFAC).

The Cham­ber com­mend­ed Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad Bisses­sar and her ad­min­is­tra­tion for se­cur­ing sup­port from the Unit­ed States. It said the an­nounce­ment reaf­firmed the long­stand­ing part­ner­ship be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go and the Unit­ed States, as well as the shared com­mit­ment of both na­tions to en­er­gy se­cu­ri­ty, eco­nom­ic growth, and re­gion­al sta­bil­i­ty.

AM­CHAM T&T al­so not­ed its op­ti­mism that the Gov­ern­ment will move to en­gage with Venezuela, in ad­di­tion to pri­vate sec­tor en­ti­ties in­volved in the project, to en­sure prepa­ra­tions are made to mon­e­tise the as­sets.

The or­gan­i­sa­tion said this process should be car­ried out in a way that de­liv­ers ben­e­fits to the peo­ple of both Trinidad and To­ba­go and Venezuela.

The Drag­on Gas field, lo­cat­ed off the coast of Venezuela, has been un­der dis­cus­sion for joint de­vel­op­ment be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go and Venezuela for sev­er­al years. U.S. sanc­tions have cre­at­ed chal­lenges to the project, and ap­proval from OFAC has been con­sid­ered a crit­i­cal step for its progress.

AM­CHAM T&T said it will con­tin­ue to fol­low the mat­ter close­ly and pro­vide sup­port to its mem­bers where pos­si­ble.