Incoming Caricom Chair calls for peaceful resolution

Dominica’s political impasse

Incoming Chair of the Caribbean Community (Caricom), Dr Keith Mitchell has called for a peaceful resolution of the dispute between Government and Opposition in Member State Dominica.

Mitchell was speaking to Journalists recently at the close of the 28th Inter-Sessional Conference of Heads of Government. He said any issue that occurred within Caricom countries must be settled within the local situation.

“All we would ask at the level of Heads is that whatever disputes exist, the

resolution of it must be done peacefully, and both sides, whether Government or Opposition, must adhere to that basic principle,” the Grenadian Prime Minister stated, continuing that whatever problem existed in any country where both sides required the input of Caricom, the Community would be “ready to play that role”.

Meanwhile, current Caricom Chair, President David Granger said the Conference received a brief on the situation and regarded it as an internal matter.

“It is quite possible that the Leader of the Opposition may not have been explaining what occurred on the streets of Roseau three weeks ago. It would be unwise to venture into that area; it is an internal matter affecting the security of a member state. We received a report from the Prime Minister and it is quite likely that what the Leader of the Opposition said was in variance of what the Prime

Minister said,” President Granger said.

While Heads of Government of Caricom member states gathered last week for the opening of the 28th Inter-Sessional meeting, Dominica’s Opposition United Workers Party (UWP) met with Journalists here, calling for the immediate establishment of a Caricom Citizenship by Investment (CBI) Regulatory Commission to “protect the integrity of Caricom citizenship and secure Caricom’s commitment to the global security arrangements for the prevention of money laundering, terrorism and other crimes”. It had also called for the removal of Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit.

Opposition Leader Lennox Linton made the call on the heels of widespread accusations by the Party against the Skerrit Administration. Skerrit has been accused of being involved in the selling of diplomatic passports and diplomatic immunity under the table, said to be in “flagrant violation of the 1961 United Nations Vienna Convention of Diplomatic Relations”. This practice, said to have been ongoing since 2004, involves “a band of international rogues and vagabonds, many of whom have been arrested for international crimes while holding Dominica Diplomatic Passports”.

“Since, like the regular passports, these Diplomatic Passports are actually Caricom Diplomatic Passports issued by Dominica, this reprehensible practice has severe implications for the entire Caricom integration grouping and needs to be addressed urgently,” Linton told Journalists.

According to Linton, Dominica, a member of the United Nations, “is now associated with a scheme to violate United Nations (UN) sanctions against Iran involving the use of Dominican registered vessels transporting sanctioned Iranian oil to China”. He said one of the operatives, Alireza Monfared, who has been accused of stealing billions of dollars from the scheme, was a diplomat of Dominica and was actually harboured, aided and abetted in Dominica as a fugitive wanted in Iran.

The Dominican Opposition Leader said Caricom Heads were duty-bound to intervene because “the Skerrit Administration cannot be left to bungle its way through these serious issues for which it accepts no responsibility, notwithstanding the grave dangers they pose for the integrity of Caricom citizenship and the security of the grouping in these times of drug trafficking, money laundering, terrorism and other crimes against human civilisation”.