For­mer min­is­ter of For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Dr Amery Browne has crit­i­cised the Gov­ern­ment’s re­sponse to the es­ca­lat­ing con­flict in the Mid­dle East, say­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go has de­part­ed from its tra­di­tion­al for­eign pol­i­cy prin­ci­ples.

Speak­ing on CNC3’s The Morn­ing Brew yes­ter­day, Browne ad­dressed the Gov­ern­ment’s state­ments fol­low­ing mil­i­tary ac­tion by the Unit­ed States against Iran and Iran’s re­tal­i­a­tion in the re­gion.

“What hap­pened in re­al­i­ty is they put out a state­ment ex­press­ing sup­port for the at­tack by the Unit­ed States of Amer­i­ca, they re­tract­ed the state­ment, and then they put out an­oth­er state­ment ex­press­ing sup­port for the mil­i­tary ac­tions of the Unit­ed States of Amer­i­ca,” Browne said.

He said even the sec­ond re­lease “be­gan with clear sup­port for the US gov­ern­ment.”

“We do not know where this war is go­ing to go,” he said, adding that there are risks not on­ly in terms of mis­siles and mil­i­tary ac­tion but al­so rep­u­ta­tion­al risks for T&T.

Browne said T&T, as a small coun­try, de­pends on in­ter­na­tion­al law and es­tab­lished norms.

“A small coun­try like ours, with­out a large navy or army or air­port, re­quires for its very ex­is­tence these laws and these norms, so that we can sur­vive and strive and plan for the fu­ture,” he said.

“Oth­er­wise, if there are no rules and no laws, any coun­try can wake up, dri­ve in­to an­oth­er one, take over an­oth­er one, any leader can be killed to­mor­row, de­pend­ing on the size of your army… The first coun­tries to dis­ap­pear and the first peo­ple to dis­ap­pear in that sce­nario would be coun­tries like ours.”

He said T&T has “al­ways main­tained a very re­spon­si­ble po­si­tion” and has sup­port­ed the In­ter­na­tion­al Crim­i­nal Court and the uni­ver­sal­i­ty of in­ter­na­tion­al law.

Browne al­so ad­dressed con­cerns about the eco­nom­ic im­pli­ca­tions of the con­flict.

“It’s al­so rel­e­vant for our pock­ets and our op­tions and op­por­tu­ni­ties as cit­i­zens and par­tic­i­pants in the econ­o­my,” he said.

“Right now, much of the ma­jor ship­ping lanes that pro­vide ma­te­ri­als, el­e­ments, goods and ser­vices to the en­tire West­ern world would be af­fect­ed by this cur­rent sce­nario.”

He ques­tioned what he de­scribed as a rush to align close­ly with Wash­ing­ton.

“To find our­selves in com­plete lock­step on for­eign pol­i­cy po­si­tions with such a large pow­er, su­per­pow­er, is not nec­es­sar­i­ly a po­si­tion of com­fort for Trinidad and To­ba­go. Con­ve­nience in the short term is not nec­es­sar­i­ly con­nect­ed to the best in­ter­est of your cit­i­zens to whom you have re­spon­si­bil­i­ty,” Browne said.

Re­spond­ing to ar­gu­ments that T&T’s trade and trav­el ties with the Unit­ed States lim­it its op­tions, Browne said, “That is a con­trived ar­gu­ment. All of the coun­tries with­in Cari­com con­tin­ue to trade with the Unit­ed States of Amer­i­ca just as be­fore. We have got­ten no ad­van­tage what­so­ev­er with re­spect to trade.”

He added, “We have got­ten noth­ing in re­turn for all of the sac­ri­fices that have been made.”

On the is­sue of US po­lit­i­cal cy­cles, Browne said the four-year cy­cle and pol­i­cy shifts mean align­ment with a sin­gle ad­min­is­tra­tion car­ries risk.

“We al­so know that there’s a con­tin­u­um process which sig­nif­i­cant­ly af­fects the abil­i­ty of any pres­i­dent to im­ple­ment or con­tin­ue a par­tic­u­lar tra­jec­to­ry,” he said.

He warned that plac­ing T&T in “com­plete lock­step” with a for­eign pow­er “re­moves our sov­er­eign voice, it de­grades our sov­er­eign voice, it iso­lates us from Cari­com and the oth­er re­gion­al and hemi­spher­ic or­gan­i­sa­tions.”

Browne al­so ref­er­enced re­la­tions with Venezuela.

“Just look at where we are left with re­spect to our re­la­tions with our near­est, very large neigh­bour, the Bo­li­var­i­an Re­pub­lic of Venezuela,” he said.

He said the Gov­ern­ment “can’t even an­swer the sim­ple ques­tion of who do you recog­nise as the le­git­i­mate au­thor­i­ty and the cur­rent pres­i­dent of Venezuela,” adding that “the prime min­is­ter of this coun­try is left as per­sona non gra­ta in the neigh­bour­ing cap­i­tal.”

Asked whether T&T is in a po­si­tion to refuse re­quests from US Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump, Browne said the is­sue is not about say­ing no to Wash­ing­ton.

“It is not a case of say­ing no to Don­ald Trump. It is a case of say­ing yes to the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go,” he said.

He said T&T had “in­sert­ed it­self and vol­un­teered to cheer­lead for ac­tions that are high­ly con­tro­ver­sial” and, “at worst, are clear vi­o­la­tions of in­ter­na­tion­al law for no good rea­son.”

“As we sit here dur­ing the month of Ra­madan, we have Mus­lim broth­ers and sis­ters who are mourn­ing and who are bleed­ing for their com­pa­tri­ots who are be­ing killed,” Browne said.

“And we have oth­ers who are not of Mus­lim per­sua­sion, but good cit­i­zens of Trinidad and To­ba­go as well, who are look­ing at the news, who are sad­dened by what they are see­ing in that re­gion, and who are ask­ing why is Trinidad and To­ba­go silent?”