Venezuela's Permanent Representative to the United Nations Samuel Moncada. File photo.
Venezuela is in a better position to settle the Essequibo territorial dispute with Guyana after the recent decision of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ratifying its adherence to the Geneva Agreement, stated Samuel Moncada, the representative of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela before the ICJ in the Guyana vs. Venezuela case. He dismissed the notion that the ICJ decision does not benefit Venezuela. On the contrary, Venezuela is now in a better position in the case, he said.
He explained that this is because the court is going to analyze and review the conduct of the United Kingdom on this issue, which is a favorable progress as far as Venezuela is concerned.
According to Moncada, the ICJ’s decision could be translated as “Venezuela is right, and the United Kingdom is part of the case even if it is not present.”
Moncada, the permanent representative of Venezuela to the United Nations, who confessed to having felt pessimistic before the court’s pronouncement, explained that “the court made a commitment to incorporate Venezuela’s reasons and continue with the trial.”
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He stressed that after the ICJ decision, Venezuela has new ways to defend its historical rights, because the narrative of the court’s pronouncement indicates which path to follow to do so.
Regarding Venezuela’s defense, Moncada said that “it has been orderly, thoughtful and brilliant from the intellectual point of view.”
National unity
Moncada commented that in the past Venezuela lost territory “because it was in civil war, it was in moments of weakness. Many believe we are in the same situation today. But national unity will save us.”
“We should not allow anyone to divide us on this issue,” said Moncada. “There are oil interests, and there are people [in Venezuela] who want to play for the opposite team.”
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Plan of oil multinationals
As for oil interests, Moncada stated that a great plan of action is underway by multinational oil companies that know that there is oil in the Essequibo territory, and they believe that the oil they could extract from there will help them replace Venezuela in the international market.
In this regard, he explained that Venezuela and Guyana used to handle the Essequibo issue bilaterally, with mutual respect, but in 2015 Exxon Mobil entered the territory to explore oil and found large deposits, and then pushed Guyana to start a case against Venezuela and paid its legal expenses.
In Moncada’s opinion, if Exxon Mobil had not paid $26 million to the government of Guyana and if the government had not given oil concessions to the multinational to explore and extract crude in the Essequibo region, “we would not have been at the court today.”
Moncada, who heads the Venezuelan delegation in defense of the Essequibo territory at the ICJ in The Hague, reported that Venezuela has been granted one year to present its case before the court.
(Últimas Noticias) by Aurig Hernández
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/SC/AF
