Contemporary Aspects of Venezuelan Foreign Policy toward Guyana.
By Winston Felix Introduction
The recent huge discovery of oil in Guyana has prompted a series of actions by Venezuela, Guyana’s western neighbour on the South American coast. ExxonMobil Corporation, an American oil giant issued a press release on May 20, 2015 stating that it had found “Significant Oil Discovery Offshore” 1 in Guyana. This development prompted Venezuela to amass thousands of troops close to Guyana’s border. This paper argues that the Venezuelan actions constitutes a challenge to Guyana’s sovereignty, as well as a challenge to international law.
The concept of sovereignty can be traced to the development of international law. It is as old as international law itself. According to one legal scholar, state sovereignty was one of the main concerns, which lead to the development of the international law.
2 A new perspective was given to state sovereignty in international law when the Treaty of Westphalia was signed bringing an end to the Thirty-Year War in 1648.
The Treaty gave the Swiss independence of Austria, and the Netherlands independence of Spain. The German principalities secured their autonomy. Sweden gained territory and a payment in cash, Brandenburg and Bavaria made gains too, and France acquired most of Alsace-Lorraine. The prospect of a Roman Catholic reconquest of Europe vanished forever. Protestantism was in the world to stay.3
The same principles that were applied to the Treaty of Westphalia were applied to the Arbitral Award of 1899, signed by Venezuela and all relevant parties. And contrary to contemporary thinking on the subject, Venezuelans were unanimous in their overwhelming support for the Arbitral Award. The same principles of state sovereignty and preservation of peace was the rationale that led the countries to endorse and support the Arbitral Award.
The Venezuelan Claim
An American historian, Clifton Child, investigated the current claim made by Venezuela for Guyana’s territory. He consulted all the volumes in the British Foreign Office, the verbatim records of the Tribunal, as well as the dispatches passing between London, St. Petersburg in Russia and New York during the relevant period. The conclusion that he drew from this study was that there was "not a single document which, by the widest stretch of the imagination, could be considered to indicate a deal between Great Britain and Russia of the sort suspected by Mr. MalletPrevost. On the contrary, the general atmosphere was one of satisfaction of the parties. Venezuela got land that would have gone to the British and Guyana got land consistent with that of the Schomburgk line. Shortly after the Award, Mr. MalletPrevost and General Harrison spoke of the award as a “victory” for Venezuela.4
The consensus was that within the Schomburgk line, lay the Amakuru River and Point Barima, the latter forming the southern entrance to the great mouth of the Orinoco River. No portion of the entire territory possessed more strategic value than this, both from a commercial and a military stand-point, and its possession by Great Britain was most jealously guarded. Both the Amakuru River and Point Barima had been awarded to Venezuela, along with it a strip of coast about 50 miles in length, both giving to Venezuela the entire control of the Orinoco River.
The Arbitrators did not stop there. In the interior, another long tract to the east of the Schomburgk line, some 3,000 square miles in extent land had also been awarded to Venezuela, The arbitrators went even further with Great Britain’s knowledge and consent. Great Britain had in fact put forward a claim to more than 30,000 square miles of territory west of the Schomburgk line, and it was this territory which in 1890 She was disposed to submit to arbitration. Every foot of this territory had been awarded to Venezuela.5
Notwithstanding the fact that the 1899 Arbitral Panel of Judges reached a definitive settlement of the border issue, the then Venezuelan President Rómulo Betancourt sought to re-open the issue for reasons unrelated to its legality. According to declassified US State Department documents, Betancourt professed “to be greatly concerned about an independent British Guiana with Cheddi Jagan as Prime Minister” whom he suspected “is already too committed to communism.” 6 Betancourt was reported in the documents covering the period 1962 to 1965, as being convinced that the area contiguous to the present boundary abounds in natural resources. During this period the Betancourt Government demonstrated the degree to which Venezuela is prepared to accomplish its foreign policy objectives in Guyana. In 1964, the Betancourt Government wanted Forbes Burnham and Peter D’Aguiar (who was the leader of the smaller political party called The United Force), to attempt to overthrow the Cheddi Jagan Administration in British Guiana. The goal to be accomplished with the assistance of men trained in Venezuela, and then form a Revolutionary Government. At the same time, Cheddi and Janet Jagan were to be kidnapped and taken to the neighboring state of Venezuela, according to reports.7
The Fear of Fidel Castro
Betancourt even went further and proposed to both the British and the Americans that they agree to a zone “under Venezuelan sovereignty.” 8 Betancourt said it would stop “the danger of
infiltration of Venezuela from British Guiana if a Castro-type government ever were established.”9 This according to the report was the real basis for the Venezuelan claim even though Betancourt government’s position in the international community was that the decision of the Arbitration was fraudulent. The declassified documents reveal that neither the British nor the Americans gave him any encouragement or support. Nonetheless, he pursued it. And, over the years, nationalist hostility toward Guyana has been generated and enflamed in Venezuela on the assertion that the 1899 Award was a fraud, despite the fact that it was accepted at the time and not challenged for 63 years.10 Since then, Venezuelan Governments have promoted that claim with varying degrees of intensity.
Venezuelan Economic Policy toward Guyana
The major challenges to Guyana’s sovereignty does not only stem from the geopolitical actions of Venezuela, but in Venezuela’s economic and trade relations with Guyana over the last decade. These policies are manifested in the Venezuelan policy of providing oil to Guyana on favorable terms. As a direct result of Venezuelan policies, sections of Guyana’s population have become more dependent on Venezuela. However, Guyana as a whole has been able to resist these overtures and has been able to recognised the challenges to its sovereignty and take appropriate steps to protect its national interests.
A major foreign policy initiative of the Venezuelan Government has been PetroCaribe. It is an Alliance between Venezuela and the Caribbean that began in 2005. The Alliance seeks to address issues pertaining to the high cost of fuel in the Caribbean. From its inception, PetroCaribe has been shrouded in secrecy. The lack of transparency and accountability continues to be a problem. Moreover, the continued reliance on Venezuelan oil has led to a dependence on oil from a sole supplier – Venezuela. The failure to seek alternative sources of energy has made many Caribbean countries dependent on Venezuela’s oil, as well as preferential
financing for development projects. In Guyana’s case, not only has it led to a reliance on oil from Venezuela, it has also led to Guyana’s rice farmers becoming dependent on Venezuela for rice markets.
Disbursements for Petroleum
It is difficult to overestimate the importance of a cost effective and reliable source of energy for the economy. Fortunately, for Guyana the cost of petroleum and its related products have been declining.
Since July of 2015, fuel costs have declined from US$105 per barrel, and is currently close to the US$50 per barrel mark. The decline in fuel cost has had a favorable impact on the world economy, and Guyana’s economy in particular. Not only did oil prices decline, the quantity of oil shipped from Venezuela also declined. The last official shipment of oil from Venezuela was July 4, 2015.11
The objectives of the PetroCaribe programme in Guyana and the Caribbean in general have been ambitious. It sought to resolve the core issue of development in the Caribbean, by providing Caribbean states with the option of purchasing oil from Venezuela on conditions based on preferential payment arrangements. The Alliance was launched on June 29, 2005 in Puerto La Cruz. In 2013, the Alliance held its 7th Summit, and adopted new measures including creating a link with the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA) in a new “Economic Zone. ”12
When the price of oil exceeds US$40 per barrel, approximately thirty per cent of each invoice is financed and the loan is repaid over 25 years at 1% interest rate per annum. Below US$40, per cent, of each invoice would be financed over 17 years at a 2% interest rate per annum. In addition, Venezuela was able to purchase products at preferential rates that may include certain items such as sugar, bananas or other goods or services that were
affected by the trade policies of the developed countries. The Agreement enabled Guyana to sell over 450,000 tons of rice to Venezuela at US$640 per ton, a price higher than anything offered by other buyers in Europe or the Caribbean.13
Under the Agreement with Venezuela, Guyana was required to establish the PetroCaribe Fund, pay part of the money for oil upfront, and the rest over a number of years at a minimal interest rate. In October 2009, Guyana signed a Special Trade Agreement with Venezuela to supply rice valued at US$18M, to pay the rice farmers and millers participating in the programme. The Government of Guyana was authorised to deduct monies from the Fund and disburse the payments to the farmers.
The rice farmers in Guyana lobbied the Government to continue the arrangement because of the favorable prices. However, notwithstanding the price support mechanisms that were instituted by PetroCaribe, the rice farmers registered their dissatisfaction with the implementation of the programme. They held several protests, claiming they received no payment for their rice. Although the rice farmers initially supported the programme, they did not receive the benefits that they anticipated from PetroCaribe. Apparently, the rice farmers themselves, became dependent on the preferential treatment from the Venezuelans.
Post Chavez Changes in Venezuela Policy
There have been several changes in Venezuelan foreign policy toward Guyana. These changes have not been systemic and have resulted in several shifts in foreign policy. After the death of the former Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez, there was a shift of foreign policy toward Guyana. There was a marked increase in military interventions in Guyana’s Territory. There were several intrusions into Guyana’s territory, including its air and maritime space. On one occasion, the Venezuelan military entered Guyana’s territory and destroyed Guyanese mining property and
equipment. More recently, in 2013, a seismic survey ship contracted by Guyana was seized by the Venezuelan Navy in Guyana’s waters in the Atlantic Ocean and held under arrest in Venezuela.
The incident occurred on October 10, 2013, when Venezuelan Naval Forces seized the Teknik Perdana. MV Teknik Perdana is a Seismic Exploration Ship indirectly contracted to US oil company Anadarko Petroleum Corporation Inc. to explore the company’s Roraima Block, offshore Guyana with a view to determining whether commercial quantities of hydrocarbon existed there. Caracas subsequently charged the Captain of the Ship with allegedly violating Venezuela’s Exclusive Economic Zone and The Vessel and the crew were later released. The exploration plans of Anadarko thereafter have been put on hold.
The shift in policy toward Guyana coincides with growing domestic issues of the current President. Previously, Chavez had softened his stance when he visited Guyana in 2004, stating that Caracas would no longer object to Development Projects in the Essequibo Region. Since his passing, his successor President Maduro has pursued a more aggressive Foreign Policy toward Guyana, notwithstanding his public pronouncements. For instance, on August 31, 2013, President Maduro reiterated his Government’s Policy toward Guyana during a State Visit. He said: “Never again in the history of our countries [should we] allow ourselves to be dragged into the path of hatred, of chauvinism, of racism or enable intrigue to harm the moral body of our two nations.”14
Although there have been several changes in Venezuelan approach to dealing with Guyana, there is now a major shift away from a Judicial Settlement of the Controversy. That Controversy centers on the Venezuelan claim that the Arbitral Award that it signed in 1899, is invalid! The Economic and Political implications of both Guyana and Venezuela will be reviewed.
The historical development of the issues involved and the prevailing situation in both countries will be analysed.
Guyana’s relationship with its neighbours has often been a contentious issue. Both Venezuela and Suriname had laid claims to its territory. With respect to its southern neighbor, Brazil, relations have historically been cordial. We will dwell on the relationship with Venezuela, as over the years, Venezuela's claim to the Essequibo Region of British Guiana,15 has been a bitter one. Other territorial issues such as the one between Guyana and Surname, has been resolved by legal means. Today, both Guyana and Suriname are members of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), and enjoy numerous Cultural Exchanges. These Cultural Exchanges also characterised the relationship between both Venezuela and Columbia. Historical and Cultural differences between both Venezuela and Guyana may help explain the century old problem between the two countries.
Venezuelan Domestic Politics
The most plausible explanation as to why Venezuela now seeks to advance its claim on Guyana at this particular time can be understood in the context of the internal dynamics of Venezuelan society. Since the fall of oil prices, and the concomitant fall in revenues to the Venezuela Government, Social, Economic, and Political problems have intensified. The crime rate has risen, although the Maduro Government would like to create the perception that all is well
"In Venezuela, the right to life is inviolable, it's sacred."16 declared
Attorney General Luisa Ortega Diaz - who presented the Government’s Official Report - before the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Committee. However, the World Health Organization (WHO) reports that in 2014, Venezuela reached a homicide rate of 57.6 per 100,000 inhabitants, equivalent to 17,259 murders in one year.
Venezuela now ranks second, after Honduras, on the list of countries with the highest Murder Rate in the world. According to the Global Report on Homicides 2013, the world average is 6.2 murders per 100,000 inhabitants, while Venezuela’s rate is 53.7 violent deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, which is tantamount to say that at least 16,702 people lost their lives as a result of criminal violence. Compared to this Data, the figure provided by Ortega Diaz is ten times higher than the world average and 11 points higher than the average in the United Nations Global Report on Homicides 2013.
Henrique Capriles, an opposition figure, who is also Governor of Venezuela’s Miranda State, has often been succinct in his criticism of Maduro. He criticised Maduro for using the Essequibo issue to draw attention from the other Political and Economic Problems facing the oil-rich country.
Following an address President Maduro made to the Venezuela’s National Assembly saying that he would reclaim Essequibo, the opposition figure Capriles responded saying: “Yesterday we saw in the National Assembly that they now want to retrieve the Essequibo, who will believe them?” 17
He went on to say: “Maduro was Foreign Minister for six years and now you realise there is a territory to claim? Please! What they want is to put an issue on the table to divert the attention of the Venezuelan people from the issues that affect them.”18
One of Venezuela’s leading political commentator and analyst calls the action of Venezuela a form of Economic War. He considers the issue with neighboring Guyana is: “Nothing but an attempt to give off-shore oil investors in Guyana cold feet. This isn’t the prelude to a War, or an Invasion, much less some adolescent fantasy liberation of a long-lost corner of the patria (home). It is just the mindless bullying of a tiny, poor country by its larger neighbour in some ... display of primate dominance.
Nothing more, nothing less. The problem is that we Venezuelans are poorly positioned to grasp this, because we approach the Essequibo issue through two generations of hardcore, know nothing chauvinist propaganda. A toxic mix of wounded pride and demagogic posturing pioneered by Acción Democrática made this claim so politically addictive even chavismo (the Chavism of Hugo Chávez) couldn’t jettison it overboard."19
Granting of Venezuela Citizenship
In a continuing shift away from the policies of the previous Administration, the Maduro Government announced that it will launch a diplomatic strategy to recover the territory of Essequibo. A new office was called the Office for the Rescue of the Essequibo, and the purpose of the office was to “organize a process to recover that geographic space that belongs to Venezuela,”20 according to Retired Colonel Pompeyo Torrealba Rivero, who advises President Nicolás Maduro on Citizenship issues.
Colonel Rivero disclosed that President Maduro ordered the Ministry of Education to teach Essequibo as a topic in Universities, as well as Elementary and High Schools. The information is also to be disseminated in the media located in bordering areas. He also proposed to issue identity cards for the 200,000 estimated inhabitants of the Essequibo, plus an Awareness Campaign to make the population of Guyana understand that the territory belongs to Venezuela.21
The new policy of Venezuela to recover land in Guyana can be compared with its approach to the area during the late nineteenth century. The unsettled border between British Guiana and Venezuela became of importance to the British at the time of the Gold Rush of the 1840s. At the time Venezuela failed to respond to British overtures. Essequibo was just considered to be a jungle area and Venezuela already had its fair share of jungle. However, when gold and diamonds became important in the late nineteenth century, Venezuelans started to pay attention to the area. According to Guyanese Diplomat Cedric L. Joseph, who laboured on a Treatise pertaining to Guyana-Venezuela Boundary Controversy22
Cedric Joseph postulated that Nations States experiencing domestic disruption and dislocation or approaching strongly contested general elections are inclined to resort to dramatic action, sometimes in their foreign policy, to divert domestic attention and cultivate jingoism at home.
Such action can be directed against a neighboring state which is perceived to be enmeshed in domestic turmoil affecting national cohesion and national responses. Since the elections of December 1997, Guyana appears to offer such temptation. Further, the pursuit of such activist foreign policy is usually premised upon an analysis that the foreign policy of the neighboring victim state is vulnerable and susceptible to probing.23
This view of Venezuela’s current interventionist approach to dealing with Guyana is not a novel view. However, different reasons have been advanced for Venezuela’s shifting foreign policy toward Guyana. The underlying premise is that Venezuelan foreign policy toward Guyana is not grounded on the tenets of International Law, nor is it based on some of the lofty principles of mutual respect and non-interference in the internal affairs of Sovereign States. It is a function of the domestic affairs of Venezuela.
Director of the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies at Duke University, Patrick Duddy analyzed the prevailing political situation in Venezuela by explaining the major reason for
Venezuelan actions. He argues that Venezuela is in a state of protracted crisis. He argues that Inflation rose by 68 per cent last year and may soon reach 100 per cent.24
Director Duddy adds that the economy has contracted sharply and is expected to shrink further this year. The failure of President Hugo Chavez’s successor, President Nicolas Maduro, to respond effectively to these challenges has caused his approval ratings to plummet to just 23 percent. The Venezuelan government has become more authoritarian since Maduro's election in 2013. Antigovernment demonstrations in response to inflation and food shortages were repressed with force, resulting in several dozen people killed, hundreds injured, and thousands arrested!25 This situation has not been abated in Venezuela. The Opposition Leader remains incarcerated and the political climate in Venezuela remains unstable.
Current Venezuelan Objectives
One of the major Foreign Policy objectives of Venezuela has been to shift the focus away from adjudication. The current focus is on renewing the Good Officer Process. Since 1990, that process has not resulted in any improvement in the relations between the two countries. The view of Guyana is that the process has been abused as evidenced by the systemic violations of the Geneva Agreement.
The Geneva Agreement of 1966 afforded Venezuela an opportunity to present its evidence to support the contention of the nullity of the Arbitral Award. The forum through which Venezuela could have presented its evidence was the Mixed Commission. However the very Mixed Commission in which Venezuela was adequately represented, failed to disturb the Arbitral Award. Moreover, the life of that Commission has expired.
The only recourse now left to Venezuela is to undermine any Judicial Review of the Controversy. The strategy that has emerged from Caracas is to shift the focus from domestic issues to Foreign Policy Issues and convey the perception to the Venezuelan public that the Government will reclaim the oil rich Essequibo from Guyana. At the same time, Caracas will continue to resist any attempt to take the issue to the ICJ at The Hague. Cognizant that over a century ago, Venezuela Government itself accepted the Arbitral Award of 1899 as a victory for Venezuela! President Maduro will continue to resist any attempt to pursue the matter at the level of the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
On 29 March 2018, Guyana filed in the Registry of the ICJ an Application Instituting Proceedings Against Venezuela, with respect to “the Legal Validity and Binding Effect of the Award regarding the Boundary between the Colony of British Guiana and the United States of Venezuela, of 3 October 1899.”26 In its Application, Guyana sought to have the Court exercise its jurisdiction over the issue with Venezuela and declare the following:
⚫ The 1899 Award is valid and binding upon Guyana and Venezuela, and the boundary established by that Award and the 1905 Agreement is valid and binding upon Guyana and Venezuela;
⚫ Guyana enjoys full sovereignty over the territory between the Essequibo River and the boundary established by the 1899 Award and the 1905 Agreement, and Venezuela enjoys full sovereignty over the territory west of that boundary; Guyana and Venezuela are under an obligation to fully respect each other’s sovereignty and territorial integrity in accordance with the boundary established by the 1899 Award and the 1905 Agreement;
⚫ Venezuela shall immediately withdraw from and cease its occupation of the eastern half of the Island of Ankoko, and
each and every other territory which is recognized as Guyana’s sovereign territory in accordance with the 1899 Award and 1905 Agreement;
⚫ Venezuela shall refrain from threatening or using force against any person and/or company licensed by Guyana to engage in economic or commercial activity in Guyanese territory as determined by the 1899 Award and 1905 Agreement, or in any maritime areas appurtenant to such territory over which Guyana has sovereignty or exercises sovereign rights, and shall not interfere with any Guyanese or Guyaneseauthorized activities in those areas;
⚫ (e) Venezuela is internationally responsible for violations of Guyana’s sovereignty and sovereign rights, and for all injuries suffered by Guyana as a consequence.”27
According to the ICJ, the Government of Venezuela filed no pleadings and did not appear at the oral proceedings, no formal submissions were presented by that Government. However, it is clear from the correspondence and the Memorandum received from Venezuela that it contends that the Court lacks jurisdiction to entertain the case. 28
Notwithstanding Venezuela’s limited participation in the case, the Court proceeded to address the jurisdictional issues in the case. These were the findings:
Guyana’s claims concerning the validity of the 1899 Award about the frontier between British Guiana and Venezuela and the related question of the definitive settlement of the land boundary dispute between Guyana and Venezuela fall within the subjectmatter of the controversy that the Parties agreed to settle through the mechanism set out in Articles I to IV of the Geneva Agreement, in particular Article IV, paragraph 2, thereof, and that, as a consequence, the Court has jurisdiction ratione materiae to entertain these claims.
With respect to its jurisdiction ratione temporis, the Court noted that the scope of the dispute that the Parties agreed to settle through the mechanism set out in Articles I to IV of the Geneva Agreement is circumscribed by Article I thereof, which refers to “the controversy . . . which has arisen as the result of the Venezuelan contention that the Arbitral Award of 1899 . . . is null and void”. The use of the present perfect tense in Article I indicates that the parties understood the controversy to mean the dispute which had crystallized between them at the time of the conclusion of the Geneva Agreement. 29
In light of the foregoing, the Court concluded that it has jurisdiction to entertain Guyana’s claims concerning the validity of the 1899 Award about the frontier between British Guiana and Venezuela and the related question of the definitive settlement of the dispute regarding the land boundary between the territories of the Parties. The ICJ noted that Venezuela referred, in the preliminary objections submitted on 7 June 2022, to Guyana’s possible lack of standing and that the final submissions of Venezuela include references to its “preliminary objections” in the plural. However, the Court understood Venezuela to be making in substance only a single preliminary objection based on the argument that the United Kingdom is an indispensable third party without the consent of which the Court cannot adjudicate upon the dispute. The Court addressed the Parties’ arguments concerning Venezuela’s preliminary objection on this basis.30
Guyana submitted that the Court should reject Venezuela’s preliminary objection that, in these proceedings, the United Kingdom is an indispensable third party in the absence of which the Court cannot decide the question of the validity of the 1899 Award. Guyana argued that the United Kingdom does not have legal interests that could be affected by the Court’s determination of the validity of the 1899 Award, let alone interests that “constitute the very subject-matter” of the decision. Guyana maintained that the United Kingdom has no current legal interest in, or claim to, the territory in question, having relinquished all
territorial claims in relation to this dispute when the United Kingdom granted independence to Guyana in 1966. It follows, therefore, that since the dispute concerns claims to territory contested between Guyana and Venezuela, the United Kingdom has no legal interests that could constitute the very subject-matter of this dispute, and there is no basis for the Court to decline to exercise its jurisdiction on account of the absence of the United Kingdom. 31
In support of its argument that the United Kingdom is not an indispensable third party in these proceedings, Guyana argued that it is not the lawfulness of any conduct by the United Kingdom that would be evaluated by the Court in determining the validity of the 1899 Award, but rather the conduct of the arbitral tribunal. Guyana stated that the conduct which the Court must address in this case is that of the arbitrators and not that of the United Kingdom, and even though a finding of misconduct by the arbitrators may require factual findings in relation to acts attributable to the United Kingdom, it would not require any legal findings in relation to the responsibility of the United Kingdom. 32
Guyana also argued that the United Kingdom consented to the Court’s exercise of jurisdiction in this case by virtue of negotiating, and becoming a party to, the Geneva Agreement. Guyana asserted that that the United Kingdom has given its consent for the Court to resolve this dispute between Guyana and Venezuela, by virtue of Article IV, paragraph 1, of the Geneva Agreement (reproduced in paragraph 92 below), which accorded to Guyana and Venezuela the sole right to refer the dispute to the Court, without any involvement on the United Kingdom’s part. Guyana maintains that the United Kingdom gave its consent, knowing full well that any resolution of the controversy would require the examination of Venezuela’s allegations of wrongdoing by the United Kingdom in the nineteenth century. 33
Guyana added that it matters not whether the effect of the Geneva Agreement “is characterized as an expression of consent [by the
United Kingdom] to the procedure being followed without its involvement, or as a waiver of any rights it may normally have in the conduct of those processes including judicial processes”. According to Guyana, the existence of consent on the part of the United Kingdom renders Venezuela’s objection based on the Court’s Judgment in the case concerning Monetary Gold Removed from Rome in 1943 and subsequent jurisprudence inapplicable. 34
Finally, Guyana cited certain statements made jointly by the United Kingdom and other States in multilateral fora, whereby they welcomed the 2020 Judgment of the Court and expressed their support for the ongoing judicial settlement of the dispute between Venezuela and Guyana. According to Guyana, these statements demonstrate that the United Kingdom itself considers that it has no legal interests that might be affected by a judgment on the merits in this case. In this respect, Guyana also refers to other conduct by the United Kingdom since Guyana attained independence. It adds that Venezuela’s own conduct in that same period contradicts any contention that the United Kingdom has any legal interest in the issue of the validity of the 1899 Award. 35
In its ruling, the ICJ noted that the good offices process which were conducted by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Venezuela stated that the good officers always took place upon acceptance by both Parties. Again. The Court observed that the United Kingdom did not seek to participate in the procedure set out in Article IV to resolve the dispute; nor did the Parties request such participation. Venezuela’s exclusive engagement with the Government of Guyana during the good offices process indicates that there was agreement among the parties that the United Kingdom had no role in the dispute settlement process. 36
In view of the above, the practice of the parties to the Geneva Agreement further demonstrated their agreement that the dispute could be settled without the involvement of the United Kingdom. In light of the foregoing, the Court concluded that, by virtue of being a party to the Geneva Agreement, the United Kingdom
accepted that the controversy between Guyana and Venezuela could be settled by one of the means set out in Article 33 of the Charter of the United Nations, and that it would have no role in that procedure. Under these circumstances, the Court considered that the Monetary Gold principle was not applicable. It followed that even if the Court, in its Judgment on the merits, were called to pronounce on certain conduct attributable to the United Kingdom, which cannot be determined at present, this would not preclude the Court from exercising its jurisdiction, which is based on the application of the Geneva Agreement. The ICJ then rejected the preliminary objection raised by Venezuela. 37
As stated earlier, Venezuelans have historically had very limited interest in British Guiana. There were virtually no cultural, educational nor linguistic ties between the two countries. From the early nineteen century when Venezuela was about to be recognized as a sovereign state, the war lords were largely interested in securing and consolidating their own political power in Venezuela. The military rulers consistently failed to demarcate the boundaries between the two countries. It was not until the era of the Gold Rush, Guyana’s Independence and the massive discoveries of oil that Venezuela registered interests in Guyana. Today, Venezuela recognizes that its interests are at stake at the ICJ. Hence, its engagement in the process.
The Treaty of Washington signed by Venezuela in 1897 and the Geneva Agreement signed by Venezuela in 1966 have consistently been ignored. The prima facie interpretation of the Geneva Agreement shows that Venezuela consented to United Nations jurisdiction. In fact, all of the relevant parties expressly consented to accept the decision of the United Nations Secretary General with respect to the means of resolution of any controversy over the validity of the 1899 Award, including judicial settlement by the ICJ.
One of the major foreign policy objectives of Venezuela has been to shift the focus away from adjudication. The current
focus is on renewing the Good Offices Process. Since 1990, that process has not resulted in any improvement in the relations between the two countries. Both countries were obligated to keep within the ambit of the Good Offices Process. That process effectively ended when the last special representative died in April 2014. In addition, Guyana had informed the UN that it had no desire to further participate in the process. The view of Guyana is that the process had been abused as evidenced by the systemic violations of the Geneva Agreement.
Conclusion
Venezuela has utilized geopolitical strategies in its efforts to challenge Guyana’s sovereignty. It has even used Military Force in contravention of the tenets of International Law. It sought to use trade and its foreign economic policy to exert control over Guyana’s economy. These efforts were calculated to undermine Guyana’s Sovereignty. Guyana is now less dependent on Venezuelan Oil and rice farmers in Guyana are less reliant on Venezuelan Markets. Venezuela is expected to continue with its practice of military intervention in Guyana, notwithstanding the fact that the Arbitral Award of 1899 has not been disturbed. These practices contravene the very notion of State Sovereignty and contravenes the integrity of the International System that has existed since the Treaty of Westphalia.
End Notes
1 Stephen M. Greenlee, “ExxonMobil Announces Significant Oil
Discovery Offshore Guyana,” ExonMobile Press Release, May 20, 2015
2 Steinberger, H. “Sovereignty,” Bernhardt, R. (ed.), Encyclopaedia of Public International Law. Elsevier, 2000.
3 Richard Cavendish History Today Volume 48 Issue 10 November 1998
4 Clifton Child, “The Mallet-Prevost Memorandum,” October 1950, of the American Journal of International Law. Volume 44, Number 4.
5 Ibid.
6 Winston Felix, The Shifting Foreign Policy of Venezuela Toward Guyana. Guy-Associates, 2010
7 Ibid.
8 Ibid
9 Ibid
10Odeen Ishmael, The Trail Of Diplomacy: A Documentary History of the Guyana-Venezuela Border, Part five. Xlibris, 2013.
11Mahender Sharma, Annual Report, Guyana Energy Agency, 2015.
12Ryan Mallett-Outtrim, “Petrocaribe Meets in Venezuela, Links With ALBA,”Venezuelanalysis. May 6, 2013. http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/9087
13Ibrd
14Winston Felix, Issues in Guyana’s Development. GuyAssociates, 2015 pp 45-46.
15Otto Schoenrich, "The Venezuela-British Guiana Boundary Dispute", July 1949, American Journal of International Law. Vol. 43, No. 3. p. 523. Washington, DC. (USA).
16Sancho Araujo, “Runaway Crime,”El Universal, July 11, 2015.
17Winston Felix, The Shifting Foreign Policy of Venezuela Toward Guyana. Guy-Associates, 2010. 34
18ibid
19Francisco Toro, “Economic War)” Caracas Chronicles, June 12, 2015 http://caracaschronicles.com/2015/06/12/economicwar/( access ed on Aprl 22, 2016)
20Pompeyo Torrealba Rivero, “Venezuela launches strategy to recover the Essequibo,”El Universal, July 10,2015 http://www.eluniversal.com/nacional-ypolitica/150710/venezu ela-launches-strategy-to-recover-theessequibo, ( accessed on April 22, 2016)
21ibid
22Cedric L. Joseph, Anglo-American Diplomacy and the Reopening of the Guyana-Venezuela Boundary Controversy, 1961-1966, Trafford Publishing, 2008
23Cedric L. Joseph, “A persistent threat to Guyana's territorial integrity,” Stabroek News, October 4, 2998
24Patrick Duddy, Political Crisis in Venezuela, Council on Foreign Relations Press, March, 2015.
http://www.cfr.org/venezuela/political-crisis-venezuela/p3635 6, (accessed on April 22, 2016)
25Ibid.
26The International Court of Justice, Guyana files Application Application againt Venezuela. 4th April, 2018. https://www.icjcij.org/node/105581.
27Ibid.
28The International Court of Justice, Judgement 6th April, 2023 https://www.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/ 171/17120230406-JUD-01-00-EN.pdf
29Ibid
30Ibid
31The International Court of Justice, Guyana’s Memorial https://www.icj-cij.org/node/105918. 11/19/2018
31 Ibid.
32 Ibid 33 Ibid 34 Ibid 35 Ibid
36 The International Court of Justice, Judgement 6th April, 2023
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