Tensions continue over the Essequibo. More of 5,600 Venezuelan troops are participating, since this Thursday, in a series of military exercises ordered by the President of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduroby way of “answer to the provocation and threat of the United Kingdom”a country that sent a warship to Guyana in the middle of the centenary conflict territorial between the two South American countries.
“I have tidy the activation of one joint action of all the Bolivarian National Armed Forces over the Eastern Caribbean of Venezuela, in the Atlantic Facadeof character defensive and how answer to the provocation and threat of the United Kingdom against peace and sovereignty of our country,” he expressed Ripe on a radio and television network, accompanied by his senior military commanders.
What did the Venezuelan military exercise consist of?
The first phase of Venezuelan military exercises “they had 5,682 combatants”according to what he said during the television broadcast general commander of the Navy, Admiral Neil Villamizar Sánchez. Warplanes were shown patrolling the area under the radio slogan of “combat role”.
They participated F-16 fighter aircraft and Russian Sukhoiin addition to Warships, ocean patrol vessels, boats armed with missiles and some amphibious vehicles. The exercises were deployed from the state of Sucre (northeast), very close to Trinidad and Tobagojust in front of the water limits in dispute with Guyana.
The Venezuelan government had earlier asked Guyana to take “immediate actions for withdrawal of the ship HMS Trent”, in addition to “refrain to continue involving military powers in the territorial controversy”.
venezuela-esquibo-guyana.jpg
What did Guyana say about the British performance?
According to the testimony of a source from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Guyana, they would have told AFP that the British ship HMS Trent will reach its shores Friday and will remain in its territory for “less than a week”for defense exercises in open sea. It does not plan to dock in Georgetown.
The arrival of HMS Trent break a fragile truce between both countries within a century-old struggle for territory of the Essequiborich in oil, after a meeting on December 14 between Maduro and his Guyanese counterpart, Irfaan Aliin which both committed to do not escalate to a military conflict.
Both leaders then agreed that their governments, both “directly or indirectly, they will not use force mutually under any circumstances,” according to a joint declaration subscribed in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
“We believe in diplomacy, in dialogue, in peace”he expressed this Thursday Ripe. “But no one should threaten Venezuela, no one should mess with Venezuela. We are men of peace, we are a people of peace, but we are warriors and this threat is unacceptable for any sovereign country (…), the threat of the decadent, rotting, former empire of the United Kingdom is unacceptable. “We don’t accept it.”.
On December 18, the head of diplomacy of the United Kingdom in America, David Rutleyreaffirmed the back of the British government to Guyanaat a meeting in Georgetown with Ali.
What is the dispute between Guyana and Venezuela about?
From Venezuela we maintain that the Essequiboa region of 160,000 km2 rich in natural resources, is part of its territory as it was in 1777, when it was cologne of Spainand appeals to Geneva agreementsigned in 1966, before Guyana’s independence of the United Kingdom, which laid the foundations for a negotiated solution and annulled an 1899 awardwhich from Georgetown they ask the International Court of Justice (ICJ) that ratify.
Tensions between both countries increased after the holding of a referendum on the sovereignty of Essequibo, which took place on December 3 in Venezuelawhich awakened in the region the fear of a armed conflict between neighbors.
HMS Trent moved to the Caribbean to fight drug trafficking in early December, although it usually operates in the Mediterranean Sea.
The British Ministry of Defense did not confirm the arrival of the ship to Guyanese waters, but in a previous statement it was reported that the ship would comply in Guyana “a series of commitments in the region”.
Source: Ambito
