TOPSHOT – Aerial view of the Essequibo area taken from Guyana on December 12, 2023. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his Guyanese counterpart, Irfaan Ali, will meet on December 14, 2023 in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, on their nations’ rising dispute over the oil-rich area of Essequibo, amid mounting worldwide warnings towards escalating the row. (Photo by Roberto CISNEROS / AFP) (Photo by ROBERTO CISNEROS/AFP through Getty Images)
Roberto Cisneros | Afp | Getty Images
Venezuela and Guyana have agreed not to use force or threaten each other in their long-standing dispute over a border area with enormous oil reserves.
The resource-rich territory of Essequibo has been thrust into the worldwide highlight after Venezuela just lately revived its claim to the land following a 2015 discovery of oil off the area’s coast.
In a tense assembly held in St. Vincent and the Grenadines on Thursday, Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro and Guyana President Mohamed Irfaan Ali reaffirmed their dedication to “good neighborliness” and “peaceable coexistence.”
The two nations declared that they’d “not threaten or use force towards each other in any circumstances, together with these consequential to any current controversies between the 2 States.”
Maduro and Ali additionally agreed to set up a joint fee of overseas ministers and officers to handle any issues relating to Essequibo, a 61,600 square-mile region that covers most of Guyana.
Both nations stated they plan to meet once more in Brazil inside the subsequent three months to resolve any excellent points.
“I’m glad to have been face to face as I needed it for a very long time,” Maduro stated Friday via X, previously often known as Twitter, in accordance to a Google translation. He thanked Guyana’s Ali “for his candor and willingness to have interaction in broad dialogue.”
“It was price it to increase the flag of fact, to increase our historic causes and to search, with Bolivarian Peace Diplomacy, the trail of dialogue and understanding to channel this historic controversy,” Maduro stated.
The Essequibo dispute
The dispute over Essequibo stretches again over a century, however tensions have flared just lately after Maduro claimed sovereignty over the area following a disputed referendum.
Venezuelans on Dec. 4 approved a referendum to declare sovereignty of Essequibo, a end result which sparked outcry in Guyana.
In 1899, a world arbitral tribunal awarded the territory of Essequibo to Britain, when Guyana was nonetheless beneath its colonial rule. Venezuela has actively disputed this ever since. Indeed, Maduro in November accused Guyana, the U.S. and oil corporations of robbing Venezuela of its territory by way of “authorized colonialism.”
Guyana has maintained that the accord is authorized and binding, and in 2018 sought the International Court of Justice to rule it as such.
The International Court of Justice on Dec. 1 ordered Venezuela to chorus from making any transfer that may change Guyana’s management over Essequibo.
— CNBC’s Lee Ying Shan contributed to this report.