Rowley: Few still want Maduro overthrown

SINCE January to present, fewer countries in the region now want a military intervention to oust Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro, trumpeted the Prime Minister at a briefing yesterday to mark his return from a visit to Washington DC. He met US congressmen and kept abreast of developments at regional fora like the OAS and UN General Assembly (UNGA).

He related that last January at the OAS, the threat of military force against Maduro loomed large after promotion by countries in the Lima Group. TT and Caricom overall had not supported intervention.

“That has not taken place, but that expectation is not dead.”

He said an alignment called the Rio Treaty urged intervention in a country when deemed necessary, but TT had recently abstained on such a vote, as had Chile, Costa Rica and Panama.

Rowley said another vote on Venezuela would be taken within days at the margins of the UNGA, plus another vote at the OAS on regime change in Venezuela. The appetite for military intervention has subsided considerably.”

Some countries which had voted for regime change in January are now not supporting any such action under the Rio Treaty.

Dr Rowley said his “fruitful and direct talks” with influential congressmen had led to a commitment that US congressional committees would soon meet over Venezuela plus the threat to the Caribbean financial sector.

He said the latter was “a far-reaching development” and would be attended by Caricom governments. Further, a congressional committee will visit TT on October 8, he added. The PM said it is very easy for a small country like TT to pass unnoticed in the world or worse yet to be misrepresented.

He said most of his interactions in the US had pertained to the Venezuela situation. While the Americans politicians may have some differences of view, they all put their country’s interest first, someone we’d do well to learn, Rowley said. Otherwise Rowley said everyone he met on his visit had congratulated him for TT’s Venezuelan migrant registration exercise, in the face of a big problem (of the Venezuelan exodus.)

Asked if recent drone attacks on a Saudi Arabian oil processing hub would increase global oil prices, Rowley said this was all up to market forces.