Prime Minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines told the UNGA77 that the continuing deteriorating situation in Haiti demands focused attention from the United Nations.
The Caribbean Community (CARICOM), to which Haiti belongs, is pained at Haiti’s circumstances and the relative neglect by the international community of this nation of inestimable value. Together, we must do better with, and for, Haiti in concert with the Haitian people, based on their own home-grown solutions, and led by them, Gonsalves stated.
“St. Vincent and the Grenadines has been actively engaged on this issue within both CARICOM and the United Nations. Haiti’s eleven million people deserve better; further, a safe and prosperous Haiti means a far more secure and peaceful Caribbean”.
Gonsalves said in the Caribbean, beyond the Haitian issue, national and regional efforts are stymied by the unfairness and relative unresponsiveness of the global political economy; oft-times, too, the unintended consequences of the actions by the centres of imperialism or hegemonic forces induce suffering, or hold back our progress.
“For example, our Caribbean has had its correspondent banking arrangements compromised or withdrawn by the application of rules which our governments have had little or no role in making. Similarly, “black lists” or sanctions are imposed or threatened by faceless bureaucrats in imperial centres, for this or that matter, without any regard for multilateral rule-making or settled international law. [And unjust, unilateral, and illegal sanctions against Venezuela and the weaponising of the banking system have had the effect of bringing to an end the Petro Caribe Agreement which benefitted tremendously most Caribbean countries; yet, we note that a special carve-out is being sought for Europe from these very sanctions consequent upon that continent’s well-publicised, pressing energy requirements”.
Unfairness, plain wickedness, and hypocrisy are at once conjoined by imperialism, Gonsalves told the 77th session of the United Nations Assembly.
