Trinidad and Tobago's Housing Minister Phillip Edward Alexander. File photo.
Caracas (OrinocoTribune.com)—The vice president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodríguez, criticized statements by Trinidad and Tobago’s Housing Minister Phillip Edward Alexander who had suggested that India would “nuke Venezuela” to protect the Caribbean island nation.
“The only nuclear bomb fell on the brain of this official who has just arrived in government,” the Venezuelan vice president wrote on social media on Saturday, September 20. She accompanied her post with an image of a news article about the minister’s statement.
Rodríguez’s comment came in response to one of Alexander’s social media post from earlier in the week. Invoking the large Indian-descendant community of Trinidad and Tobago, estimated at 42% of the country’s 1.4 million population, the Trinidadian minister suggested that the government of India would “nuke” Venezuela to defend the Caribbean island.
“Let us pretend Trinidad is a black country … They don’t want you to know that the largest group of people in Trinidad and Tobago are of East Indian descent, and [Indian Prime Minister] Modi and India have us held gently in the palm of his hands and he will nuke Venezuela,” Alexander wrote, as reported by Trinidadian news outlets.
Rodríguez urged Trinidad and Tobago to think of its people before attempting to attack Venezuela “and to abandon its vassalage to the US government which wants to steal our immense energy resources.”
“They have not been able to, nor will they be able to overcome our determination for freedom and self-determination, which we have exercised extensively in our peace diplomacy,” she added.
Venezuela: VP Rodriguez to Trinidad & Tobago and Guyana: ‘Do Not Dare… Do Not Even Think About It’
This exchange is the latest in a series of warnings from the Venezuelan government following recent statements by Trinidadian officials praising the ongoing US aggression against Venezuela. The government of Trinidad and Tobago has made its national territory available to the United States as a military base in the event of an “invasion” of Venezuela.
Earlier, Trinidadian Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar openly supported alleged US attacks on purportedly Venezuelan boats in international waters, saying that the US should “kill them all violently.” She had also ordered her military to use “lethal force” against any vessel originating from Venezuela.
“The government of Trinidad and Tobago, the government of Guyana, take it easy, do not dare, do not even think about it,” Rodríguez said last week. “You are lending yourselves to the evil plans of an attack against the people of Bolívar, and at the same time you are lending yourselves to destabilizing the entire Caribbean and this continent.”
Special for Orinoco Tribune by staff
OT/JRE/SC
