IR expert: Padarath adding fuel to Trinidad and Tobago-Venezuela fire

PROFESSOR Andy Knight, says Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister Barry Padarath's public utterances about a war of words between Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela do not help to resolve this matter.

Knight is a distinguished professor of international relations, University of Alberta, Edmonton Canada and a former director of the Institute of International Relations at the University of the West Indies.

At a post-cabinet news conference at the Red House on June 5, Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar said government had no evidence to substantiate the claim by the Venezuelan government that terrorists attempted to enter Venezuela via TT.

She also warned that any illegal incursion by any unidentified vessel into TT waters would be met with deadly force by local security forces.

At a function at his Couva South constituency office on June 8, Padarath praised Persad-Bissessar's actions.

“The Prime Minister has indicated, through her words and her actions, that she will not be bullied. She will not be silenced."

Padarath said all 26 UNC MPs and the two Tobago People's Party (TPP) MPs fully supported Persad-Bissessar's statements.

There is no coalition arrangement between the UNC and the TPP.

In a WhatsApp comment on June 9, Knight said, "The comments by Barry Padarath only serves to throw more fuel on to a fire."

He added, "Politicians sometimes have short memories."

Knight recalled a Caricom heads of government meeting in July 2013 and how then prime minister Persad-Bissessar warmly welcomed Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to TT.

"I still have my notes on that important meeting at the Diplomatic Centre between Persad-Bissessar and President Maduro. The TT prime minister not only warmly greeted Maduro but made the point of saying how important Venezuela was to the hemispheric affairs of the region."

Padarath was working in the OPM at that time as an aide to Persad-Bissessar.

Knight said, "I don’t know who is advising the Prime Minister this time around, but her bellicose rhetoric is so different now than her much more diplomatic and responsible statements about the importance of the relationship between TT and Venezuela then."

The more prudent strategy for TT at this moment, he continued, would be to lower the temperature and allow the diplomats within the Foreign and Caricom Affairs Ministry to meet with the Venezuelan Ambassador to TT to get to the bottom of the concerns expressed by Maduro.

"This is a time for diplomacy not for bellicose rhetoric."

A statement issued by the ministry on June 9 said Foreign and Caricom Affairs Minister Sean Sobers and Venezuelan Ambassador Alvaro Sanchez Cordero met to discuss several bilateral issues, including recent events.

After his visit in 2013, Maduro visited TT in February 2015 and signed two energy agreements at the Diplomatic Centre, St Ann's.

At that ceremony, Persad-Bissessar said, "While we already had agreements with respect to the Loran Manatee field, today we welcomed the signing of another agreement for exploitation and development of hydrocarbons in the Manakin Cocuina field, which extends across the lines between TT and Venezuela."

She added, "We also welcome the signing on energy sector co-operation between the two countries."

At that time, Persad-Bissessar said "this is the first time in the history of the western hemisphere there is commercialisation plans for cross-border reserves."

She added, "It is also the third time in the history of the world we are witnessing such co-operation."

The former PNM government negotiated with Venezuela for the separate development of Manatee and Shell took a final investment decision to proceed with this project last July. On June 5, Shell issued a notice of the continuation on Manatee.

Last July, government secured a 20-year licence from Venezuela for bpTT to exploit the Cocunia field on the Venezuela side of the unified one trillion cubic feet Cocuina/Manakin field of which bpTT already has an operatorship of the Manakin part lying in TT water.

On April 8, then prime minister Stuart Young announced the US Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) had revoked licences issued for the Dragon and Manakin-Cocuina fields in Venezuela.

On May 3, Persad-Bissessar said TT would not pursue the Dragon project but explore initiatives in Grenada, Guyana and Suriname.