Caribbean & Central America - October 2015 (ISSN 1741-4458)

*** UN HELPS GUYANA-VENEZUELA TO MEND SOME FENCES. In May, the US oil company Exxon Mobil announced that it had made “a significant discovery” of oil in waters off Guyana. The only trouble was that the waters were adjacent to the region west of the Esseuibo River that Venezuela claims as its own despite an 1899 ruling to the contrary. Accordingly, Venezuela demanded that Exxon cease its activities, and when this didn’t happen it withdrew its ambassador to Guyana in July. It also blocked the appointment of Guyana’s new ambassador to Venezuela in early September. Tensions were then further raised when Guyana’s President David Granger accused Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro of ordering an “extraordinary escalation of Venezuelan military activity”. It is thought that the oil find could amount to more than 700m barrels.

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