Venezuela wants to annex the Essequibo region in the western part of Guyana. The area is about two-thirds of the area of Guyana.
of Venezuela president Nicolás Maduro ordered more than 5,600 troops to participate in a “defense exercise” on Thursday. The exercise is a response to Britain, which was told last week to send a warship to Guyana's waters to support its former colony. This is reported by the news agency AFP.
The patrol vessel HMS Trent was ordered to head towards Guyana after the Venezuelan government threatened to annex Guyana's Essequibo region in December. The bombing of Venezuela raised fears that the country could attack its neighbor Guyana.
Patrol vessel HMS Trent is visiting Guyana as part of “a number of operations in the region,” Britain's Ministry of Defense said earlier this month, without referring to Venezuela or the border dispute, Reuters news agency reports.
According to Maduro, sending a British ship to Guyana is “practically a military threat from London”.
“It is against the spirit of dialogue, diplomacy and the peace of the agreements,” he says.
According to AFP, President Maduro said on Thursday that he was launching a “defensive exercise in response to the UK's provocation” and his country's “threat to peace and sovereignty”.
A source at Guyana's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, speaking on condition of anonymity, told AFP that the British ship is scheduled to arrive in Guyana on Friday and stay in its territorial waters for “less than a week”.
Venezuela wants to annex the Essequibo region in the western part of Guyana. The area is about two-thirds of the area of Guyana.
The regional requirements are based on the large oil reserves found in Essequibo in 2015 and internal politics.
Maduro, who has promised to hold presidential elections in Venezuela next year, is trying to increase his support among the people by demanding territory for his country. In a recent, if controversial, referendum held in Venezuela, 95 percent of voters supported the annexation of Essequibo as part of the country.
The current borders between Venezuela and Guyana are based on an agreement concluded in 1899. At that time, Guyana was still a British colony.
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