GEORGETOWN: Guyanese President David Granger has ruled out giving neighboring Venezuela access to the Atlantic as part of any settlement of the border dispute over Essequibo region.
“We cannot sell out. We cannot give away. We cannot offer the adversary any corridor or any passage,” Granger said on Tuesday after the successful completion of Exercise Greenheart, a tactical exercise in the Cuyuni-Mazaruni area in Region Seven.
The president’s comments came days after former President Bharrat Jagdeo announced that his administration had considered a negotiated settlement to the dispute with Venezuela that would have seen Guyana retain all of Essequibo region in keeping with the 1899 arbitration decision while allowing its western neighbor access to the Atlantic Ocean off Essequibo.
Granger reiterated that Guyana was committed to protecting foreign direct investment and declared that no country must intimidate or threaten investors.
Last week, in his address to Parliament, Granger said Caracas sent a letter to Guyana Gold Fields Incorporated, which operates a large mine in Aurora, Region Seven, accusing the company of infringing on the territorial sovereignty of Venezuela.
With the successful completion of the tactical exercise on Tuesday, Granger told members of the Guyana Defense Force, or GDF, “what you have done here today is an example to show our foreign direct (investors) that their investments are safe and that Guyana will use every fiber of its state system of its defense forces to protect their investment.”
Calling the exercise a timely one, because of the territorial threats Guyana faces, Granger said, “this is not an offensive operation. This is a defensive operation.”
“People must know that when they come into Guyana to invest, they will be coming into a safe environment that is protected by one of the best defense forces in the Caribbean, the GDF,” the Guyanese president said.
The long-simmering territorial dispute took on new urgency on May 20, when a subsidiary of U.S.-based ExxonMobil announced the discovery of significant oil reserves in the waters off Essequibo.
A week later, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro issued an executive order asserting sovereignty over the waters.
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