Venezuela’s Defense Minister, Vladimir Padrino López, criticized this Thursday (9) the sending of two American aircraft to Georgetown, capital of Guyana, and its surroundings, which he described as “reiterated provocations” by the United States Southern Command .
“The National Bolivarian Armed Force strongly rejects these repeated provocations from the Southern Command, provided by the government of Guyana, which has assumed the role of a new North American colony,” said Padrino López on his account on the social network X.
Venezuela claims to have sovereignty over Essequibo, a region of almost 160 thousand square kilometers rich in oil and natural resources that corresponds to 70% of Guyana’s territory.
An international decision at the end of the 19th century determined that the area belonged to the United Kingdom, from which Guyana gained independence in 1966. This year, an agreement was signed for the dispute to be resolved by an international court, which never happened.
On April 13, the Venezuelan government “energetically” rejected a recent oil production license granted by Guyana to the American company ExxonMobil in maritime areas that it said were “not delimited”, which could “compromise the resources” that Caracas considers its own. .
The conflict reached its most complicated point after Venezuela held a unilateral referendum on December 3 last year, in which it approved the annexation of that territory, and the government of Nicolás Maduro ordered the installation of a military division near the area, among other measures.
The United States Embassy in Guyana announced this Thursday on X that the deployment would be carried out with “two US Navy aircraft, F/A-18F Super Hornets, embarked on the [porta-aviões] USS George Washington” and “with the collaboration and approval” of the government of Guyana.
Likewise, it reported on its website that Southern Command Director of Strategy, Policies and Plans, Julie Nethercot, visited Guyana from May 6 to 8 to oversee “strategic planning, policy development and coordination of cooperation in security issues for Latin America and the Caribbean”.
Padrino López warned that the Comprehensive Aerospace Defense System “remains activated in the event of any attempt to violate Venezuelan geographic space”, including the disputed territory of Essequibo, which, according to Chavismo, is Venezuelan.
In 2018, Guyana filed a lawsuit against Venezuela before the International Court of Justice to resolve the territorial dispute between the two States over the Essequibo region, which is why a decision is expected in the coming years to resolve this controversy.
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