The Biden ad­min­is­tra­tion in the Unit­ed States has con­grat­u­lat­ed Ja­maica on its 62nd an­niver­sary of po­lit­i­cal in­de­pen­dence from Great Britain, say­ing that Wash­ing­ton and Kingston “have long en­joyed a close and pros­per­ous re­la­tion­ship.” 

“On be­half of the Unit­ed States of Amer­i­ca, I send my best wish­es to Ja­maica as you cel­e­brate your 62nd year of in­de­pen­dence,” said US Sec­re­tary of State Antony J. Blinken. 

“As part­ners, we are ad­dress­ing some of the most dif­fi­cult se­cu­ri­ty and eco­nom­ic chal­lenges in the re­gion and around the globe, in­clud­ing an ear­ly and dev­as­tat­ing start to the hur­ri­cane sea­son,” he added. 

Blinken said the Unit­ed States and the Amer­i­can peo­ple al­so “ap­pre­ci­ate and cel­e­brate Ja­maica’s rich cul­ture and glob­al con­tri­bu­tions across every sec­tor imag­in­able. 

“We stand with you to help im­prove cit­i­zen se­cu­ri­ty through the US-Caribbean Basin Se­cu­ri­ty Ini­tia­tive and Plan Se­cure Ja­maica, and salute your part­ner­ship and lead­er­ship in strength­en­ing re­gion­al se­cu­ri­ty, in­clud­ing the mul­ti­di­men­sion­al cri­sis in Haiti,” he said. 

Through the US-Caribbean Part­ner­ship to Ad­dress the Cli­mate Cri­sis (PACC 2030), the US Sec­re­tary of State said both coun­tries are work­ing to­geth­er to ad­dress the im­pacts of cli­mate change “while bring­ing a brighter eco­nom­ic fu­ture for both of our coun­try’s cit­i­zens.”

He said such ties would not be pos­si­ble with­out the sup­port of the “vi­brant Ja­maican di­as­po­ra in the Unit­ed States.” 

“May the year ahead be filled with hap­pi­ness and suc­cess for the Ja­maican peo­ple,” Blinken said.

Ac­cord­ing to the Na­tion­al Li­brary of Ja­maica, af­ter more than 300 years of British colo­nial rule, Ja­maica gained in­de­pen­dence on Au­gust 6, 1962. 

“The road to in­de­pen­dence was long and hard but, with promi­nent and in­stru­men­tal fig­ures such as Sir Alexan­der Bus­ta­mante and Nor­man Man­ley, Ja­maica gained its free­dom for self-gov­er­nance,” it said. “Be­com­ing in­de­pen­dent, Ja­maica’s lo­cal­ly draft­ed Con­sti­tu­tion came in­to ef­fect on Au­gust 6, 1962. 

“In­de­pen­dence is cel­e­brat­ed every year and con­tin­ues to be a well an­tic­i­pat­ed sea­son, which both re­minds us of the sig­nif­i­cance of po­lit­i­cal free­dom and sig­nals the pos­si­bil­i­ties of a brighter fu­ture,” the Na­tion­al Li­brary of Ja­maica added.

WASH­ING­TON, Aug. 8, CMC

CMC/nk/kb/2024