We are deeply con­cerned that the cur­rent con­tro­ver­sies bear­ing up­on re­la­tions be­tween T&To and the Unit­ed States of Amer­i­ca (USA) have the po­ten­tial grave­ly to dam­age our coun­try.

We re­spect­ful­ly, but firm­ly, be­lieve that there are sev­er­al con­sid­er­a­tions, which re­quire sober as­sess­ment, way above the in­ces­sant noise of par­ti­san par­ty pol­i­tics and the undiplo­mat­ic lan­guage of the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty, Stu­art Young MP.

Many of us say we are a sov­er­eign coun­try and can take our own de­ci­sions. That is cor­rect. But the USA too is a sov­er­eign coun­try, and can take its own de­ci­sions. It has been ap­ply­ing sanc­tions to Venezuela, and has made it clear that it will al­so ap­ply sanc­tions to those coun­tries, all equal­ly sov­er­eign, which vi­o­late its Venezuela sanc­tions. Giv­en the po­lit­i­cal cli­mate in Wash­ing­ton, that is a pol­i­cy po­si­tion which can­not be ig­nored.

Is T&T pre­pared to face sanc­tions, es­pe­cial­ly at this time of eco­nom­ic dif­fi­cul­ty?

Can we, in turn, im­pose sanc­tions on the USA, as, for ex­am­ple, Chi­na can? But if re­la­tions be­tween T&T and the USA are as pos­i­tive and strong as gov­ern­ment spokesper­sons (Min­is­ter Young among them) say they are, should there not be qui­et dis­cus­sions be­tween the two par­ties?

We strong­ly rec­om­mend that such dis­cus­sions be ini­ti­at­ed with a view to reach­ing mu­tu­al­ly sat­is­fac­to­ry so­lu­tions, which re­spect our sov­er­eign­ty and our for­eign pol­i­cy po­si­tions.

On a with­out prej­u­dice ba­sis, the rel­e­vance and ap­pli­ca­tion of the Rio Treaty to T&T, about which a num­ber of ex­perts have reser­va­tions, should fig­ure promi­nent­ly in such dis­cus­sions.

In or­der to fa­cil­i­tate the pro­posed dis­cus­sions, we fur­ther rec­om­mend an im­me­di­ate ces­sa­tion of the mega­phone diplo­ma­cy that seems now to be in vogue.

We have tak­en note of the calls for the res­ig­na­tion or dis­missal of Min­is­ter Young and we are in­deed dis­turbed by the re­cent con­tro­ver­sies in which he has placed him­self. None of this is good for T&T.

Hav­ing ex­am­ined the state­ments of Min­is­ter Young be­fore and af­ter the US Am­bas­sador’s state­ment of Tues­day last, we can­not avoid this com­ment: While Min­is­ter Young is pedan­ti­cal­ly in­sist­ing that the Am­bas­sador did not use the word “breach”, if the Am­bas­sador spoke of the “con­sis­ten­cy” of the Venezue­lan Vice-Pres­i­dent’s vis­it with T&T’s oblig­a­tions un­der the Rio Treaty, what oth­er than a breach could he pos­si­bly have meant?

Where was the mis­con­struc­tion?