To all Venezuelans who gave their lives on April 11, 2002 in search of freedom
It was impossible for any Venezuelan of my generation, educated in the 40 years of democracy, to draw a map of Venezuela without including the so-called Reclamation Zone, highlighted with stripes on the aforementioned map. We were told in the classrooms that Venezuela had been robbed by the British, like someone who takes candy from a child, of a huge strip of its territory in an Arbitral Agreement signed in 1899, and that the governments were actively working for its recovery in international negotiations. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, when recognizing on May 26, 1966 the independence of the natives of that territory known until then as British Guyana, and part of its Commonwealth of Nations, began to call itself the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, and the problem of the disputed territory was inherited by this new Republic.
And up to that point. From time to time we saw in the news and articles in the press that this negotiation did not advance because there was a hard position of not accepting the validity of that Arbitral Award of 1899, nor any other mechanism that would recognize it, in strict adherence to the documents that historically demonstrated our sovereignty over those territories since we were Captaincy General of Venezuela, a position assumed especially by our Armed Forces. This conduct of our military was always praised by the population, and no government or politician ever dared to give in to it... until Hugo Chávez Frías arrived.
Many years have passed since then, and far from having advanced in favor of the recovery of the Reclamation Zone, Venezuelans, most of whom have not had much knowledge of this matter, watch from the outside that we seem to be losing this fight, seeing that our counterpart, the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, openly occupies this territory and grants concessions to international oil companies in the Reclamation Zone.
A few months before recognizing the independence of British Guyana, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland signed an Agreement in Geneva with Venezuela on February 17, 1966, which historically has been called the Geneva Agreement, where it is recognized in its Article I that ".... the Arbitral Award of 1899 on the boundary between Venezuela and British Guyana is null and void", and articulates the mechanisms to reach a mutually accepted agreement between the parties (see Geneva Agreement to reach a mutually accepted agreement between Venezuela and British Guyana). the Arbitral Agreement of 1899 on the boundary between Venezuela and British Guyana is null and void", and articulates the mechanisms to reach a mutually accepted agreement between the parties (see in Spanish Geneva Agreement to settle the dispute between Venezuela and Guyana - 17-02-1966, in http://www.consulvenevigo.es/subido/ACUERDO%20GINEBRA%20ONU%201966.pdf).
It is important to clarify all this history, because here we are not discussing whether or not we have sovereignty over the Esequibo, because for Venezuela, since the Geneva Agreement of 1966, the Arbitral Agreement of 1899 is recognized as null and void between the parties, but what we are going to do with that reality, and how we are going to solve the problem with the neighbor, which still believes it has rights over that territory.
Even knowing the historical position of the Armed Forces and the entire country, then President Hugo Chávez Frías, changed Venezuela's position with Guyana from one moment to another: "In 2004 Chávez made a tour where he visited Georgetown, the capital of Guyana, where on February 19 of that year, in a press conference with the President of Guyana, Bharrat Jagdeo, he marked a change in the position Venezuela had maintained to date: "I have committed myself with President Jagdeo and with Guyana. First, that the Venezuelan government will not oppose any project in this region that will benefit its inhabitants; direct benefit as the President told me, such as a water project, roads, energy, agricultural projects. And secondly, during the emergence of any more sensitive project, we immediately activate both of us to discuss it in the High Level Binational Commission and look for its viability"" (see in Spanish Moment in which Chávez handed over the Esequibo, in https://maduradas.com/momento-chavez-abandono-la-defensa-historica-del-esequibo-ganarse-apoyo-geopolitico-guyana-video/).
The foregoing indicates that if there is a person responsible for what is happening now with the Esequibo territory and the presence of oil companies in the Reclamation Zone, it is Hugo Chávez Frías. Up to that moment, no Venezuelan government had dared to use the reclamation of our territory and the border problem with the Cooperative Republic of Guyana for political purposes. From those dirty waters came the mud we are witnessing now.
On March 29, 2018, the government of the Cooperative Republic of Guyana sued Venezuela before the International Court of Justice "with respect to a dispute concerning "the legal validity and binding effect of the Award concerning the boundary between the colony of British Guiana and the United States of Venezuela, dated October 3, 1899", and the International Court of Justice in its interpretation of the Geneva Agreement, ruled on December 18, 2020 that it had jurisdiction to decide on the matter submitted by Guyana (see in Spanish ICJ Judgment - 18-12-2020, in https://revistas.urosario.edu.co/xml/4295/429566597007/index.html).
Maduro's regime reacted in a communiqué the same day indicating that "...it denies the judicial route, incapable of reaching the practical and satisfactory settlement that this Treaty imposes on both parties", repudiating the ruling issued by the International Court of Justice (see in Spanish Venezuela rejects ICJ decision - 18-12-2020, in https://mppre.gob.ve/comunicado/venezuela-rechaza-decision-cpi-contraria-acuerdo-ginebra-guayana-esequiba/)
However, that ruling did not make as much noise in Venezuela as this month's decision, on April 6, 2023, by the International Court of Justice in response to objections filed by the regime of Nicolás Maduro Moros on June 7, 2022 (see in Spanish Venezuela files preliminary objections to the admissibility of Guyana's unilateral claim - 07-06-2022, in https://mppre.gob.ve/comunicado/venezuela-objeciones-preliminares-admisibilidad-demanda-unilateral-guyana/), whose ruling indicated that "The objection by Venezuela must be rejected (...) by 14 votes to 1 rejects the preliminary objection presented by the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela", said the judge and president of the ICJ, Joan Donoghue, reading the sentence in The Hague. "By 14 votes to 1 it determines that it can decide on the merits of the cooperative Republic of Guyana," she continued" (see in Spanish ICJ rules against Venezuela and will go to trial to define Guyana's claim for the Esequibo, in https://www.vozdeamerica.com/a/cij-falla-contra-venezuela-e-ira-a-juicio-para-definir-reclamo-de-guyana-por-el-esequibo/7039108.html).
In English that was complete bullshit, not to say the correct rudeness. The million-dollar question is why, if Venezuela historically denied the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice, as they indicated in their communiqué of December 18, 2020, an objection was filed - for whatever cause - before that international judicial instance.
Dr. Héctor Faúndez, a lawyer expert in International Law and deeply knowledgeable on the Esequibo issue, publishes in a recent article that with this action Venezuela accepted the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice: "It should be recalled that, last June 7, by filing a preliminary objection, Venezuela finally accepted the jurisdiction of the Court, and decided to appear in the proceedings before the Court. We have already appointed an ad-hoc judge, we have already appointed the agent and the alternate agents of the State, and we have already joined the proceedings before the Court, which makes it absurd that, at this point, we insist once again that the Court lacks jurisdiction" (see in Spanish Héctor Faúndez, Venezuela before the ICJ in the Esequibo case: Second warning!, in https://www.lapatilla.com/2023/04/08/venezuela-ante-la-cij-en-el-caso-del-esequibo-segundo-aviso-por-hector-faundez/).
And then? The regime, in its infinite clumsiness and acting on behalf of Venezuelans, has put us in a situation of being active in the lawsuit that Guyana wanted to bring against us, in its intention that the International Court of Justice should decide on the merits of the dispute, which is none other than to make the Arbitral Agreement of 1899 valid against Venezuela's claim.
But -and here I come to a much more fundamental issue-, is the regime of Nicolás Maduro Moros the legitimate representative of Venezuelans to act on our behalf in a trial of such importance and scope? The answer is a resounding NO. It has been internationally established that the current regime that governs the country is NOT RECOGNIZED as the legitimate representative of Venezuelans, which is the reason why a Constitutional Proxy Government was appointed in 2019, and which in a recent ruling has been reaffirmed by the legitimate Supreme Court of Justice in exile.
Venezuelans cannot lose this trial due to incompetence and what we could well call a case of "legal malpractice" in the Esequibo, by a criminal regime that in all these years -Chavez included-, has represented Venezuelans before such an important instance as the International Court of Justice, without having the legitimacy to do so. I could point out without mistake that more money has been spent in trying to recover CITGO than the Esequibo territory, a national asset exponentially more valuable for future generations, and in which the best legal professionals in the world in the practice of International Law should be working for Venezuela.
Venezuelans must mobilize as soon as possible to prevent this trial from continuing without legitimate Venezuelan representation. This situation goes beyond being just a legal problem. If we Venezuelans lose the Esequibo in this trial by not appearing before the International Court of Justice, as the regime threatens to do, we will have no choice but to ignore this possible ruling when liberties are recovered in our country, warning at the same time the government of the Cooperative Republic of Guyana that any decision taken in this controversy would not be recognized due to the non-existence of a legitimate government in Venezuela. And this should be so decided by the only legitimate judicial instance left to us in exile, properly informing the judges of the International Court of Justice of this situation. There is not much time left...
Caracas, April 11, 2023
Blog:
TIC’s & Derechos Humanos, https://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/
Email: luismanuel.aguana@gmail.com
Twitter:@laguana
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