Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

The fight against drug traf­fick­ing must rest on co­op­er­a­tion and law and in­ter­dic­tions should pro­ceed un­der clear le­gal au­thor­i­ty, says An­tigua and Bar­bu­da Prime Min­is­ter Gas­ton Browne.

Browne made the com­ment while speak­ing af­ter Trinidad and To­ba­go Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar at the Unit­ed Na­tions Gen­er­al As­sem­bly last Fri­day.

Browne cul­mi­nat­ed his ad­dress by speak­ing about the con­duct of counter-nar­cotics op­er­a­tions in the Caribbean Sea.

“With­out judg­ing facts not be­fore us, in­clud­ing re­ports of lethal in­ci­dents off the coast of Venezuela, we re­state a sim­ple prin­ci­ple: the fight against drug traf­fick­ing must rest on co­op­er­a­tion and law,” he said.

“In­ter­dic­tions should pro­ceed un­der clear le­gal au­thor­i­ty and rules of en­gage­ment that min­imise risk to life, re­spect for sov­er­eign­ty and the law of the sea, and prompt in­for­ma­tion-shar­ing and re­view.”

Browne added, “Where­as An­tigua and Bar­bu­da stands ready to work with all part­ners against traf­fick­ers, we are con­cerned with the build-up of mil­i­tary as­sets, in­clud­ing a nu­clear sub­ma­rine, in­di­cat­ing the pos­si­bil­i­ty of mil­i­tary con­flict. We re­mind every­one that our hemi­sphere should be re­spect­ed as a zone of peace, not a the­atre of mil­i­tary con­flict.”

Browne agreed that the na­tions of this world would be “bet­ter to­geth­er,” as the UN­GA theme pro­claimed.

“We must al­so re­mind this As­sem­bly that—80 years af­ter the Char­ter—‘bet­ter to­geth­er’ re­mains an as­pi­ra­tion, de­vout­ly to be wished and yet to be achieved,” he said.

“Our world is at an in­flec­tion point. A re­treat from mul­ti­lat­er­al­ism, from the tenets of in­ter­na­tion­al law, and from re­spect for hu­man rights and free­doms; warns us that we have reached a piv­otal mo­ment for hu­man­i­ty.”

Cit­ing glob­al con­flicts and their dire ef­fects, Browne added, “This, then, is pre­cise­ly the mo­ment to re­sum­mon all na­tions to the Pur­pos­es and Prin­ci­ples of the Char­ter set down 80 years ago. With­out in­ter­na­tion­al co­op­er­a­tion, uni­ver­sal peace will not be achieved.

“What hu­man­i­ty needs at this time, is not on­ly peace, but com­pas­sion, sol­i­dar­i­ty, jus­tice and love reign­ing in our hearts.”

Browne said be­lea­guered Haiti de­mands sus­tained at­ten­tion, not cy­cles of im­pro­vi­sa­tion.

“Fund­ing has ar­rived in fits and starts while suf­fer­ing has grown. We sup­port a sin­gle, Hait­ian-led plan, ex­e­cut­ed un­der a sin­gle Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil man­date and fi­nanced through a sin­gle, trans­par­ent Haiti Fund, align­ing the Unit­ed Na­tions, the Or­ga­ni­za­tion of Amer­i­can States and the Caribbean Com­mu­ni­ty, be­hind one bud­get­ed pro­gramme with pub­lic ac­count­abil­i­ty.

“Dis­burse­ments should fol­low re­sults such as: roads re­tak­en from gang con­trol, ex­tor­tion stopped, arms and il­lic­it fi­nance in­ter­dict­ed, civil­ians pro­tect­ed, and es­sen­tial ser­vices re­stored. Haiti needs one man­date, one Hait­ian-led plan, one fund—ac­count­able and trans­par­ent.

“We urge every mem­ber of the Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil, to sup­port the pro­posed Res­o­lu­tion on in­creased se­cu­ri­ty as­sis­tance for Haiti that is now be­fore it. Ac­tion is long over­due; the coun­cil must act to help Haiti and its long-suf­fer­ing peo­ple.”

Browne al­so urged nor­malised re­la­tions with Cu­ba.

Al­so de­tail­ing the cli­mate cri­sis ef­fects on small is­land states, Browne said, “Cli­mate change sci­ence is not fraud­u­lent. We ig­nore it to our own per­il.”

He de­clared that if ma­jor emit­ters will not cut green­house gas emis­sions in line with sci­ence, vic­tim states must re­tain the right to pur­sue ap­pro­pri­ate le­gal reme­dies, con­sis­tent with in­ter­na­tion­al law, for cli­mate harm.

“We sup­port a just, or­der­ly en­er­gy tran­si­tion that caps; then fair­ly phas­es down and ul­ti­mate­ly phas­es out the fu­els that dri­ve this de­struc­tion, with­out sac­ri­fic­ing en­er­gy se­cu­ri­ty or de­vel­op­ment. We favour a fair car­bon levy on the heav­i­est emit­ters, pub­lic and pri­vate, with pro­ceeds di­rect­ed to adap­ta­tion, loss and dam­age, and re­silience,” he said.

An­tigua/Bar­bu­da main­tained its po­si­tion in favour of a two-state so­lu­tion for Is­rael and Pales­tine, with Browne in­sist­ing that Is­raeli hostages be re­leased by Hamas and that the war in Ukraine must end “in peace and with jus­tice, not in the bat­tle fa­tigue of the be­sieged.”