More diplomacy from local, regional leaders needed – Jagdeo

US’s Paris Accord withdrawal

…to ensure Guyana, Region do not lose out

With the United States pulling out of the Paris Accord which Guyana, along with the entire Region and many other countries, signed on to, Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo believes that Guyana and the Caribbean can use diplomacy to mitigate the effect on the Region.
Speaking during a press conference on Friday, Jagdeo noted that US President Donald Trump made his decision to withdraw based mainly on economic factors. Trump had expressed concern about how much the agreement was costing the US.
Jagdeo pointed out that the US believed that the agreement placed it at a competitive disadvantage to other industrial superpowers. Hence, the former President observed that Guyana and the Region had a good chance of keeping US support.
“Our international trade is no threat to the United States of America. We’re below the de minimis level. And so we could have easily pointed out that the countries living in this region don’t pose a trade threat to the United States of America.”
“But a single hurricane could wipe out the equivalent of almost a hundred per cent of Gross Domestic Product. And therefore, it is important not just from a climate perspective, that we have access to favourable policies and access to global funds to help us to adapt, because most of the budgets in the Region are fiscally stressed already.”
According to Jagdeo, the point that a whole group of small nations, the Caribbean, faced dire consequences if not helped by the world superpower could have been made to any new administration in the US.
“They said they are looking at renegotiating a Paris agreement. But to seek to preserve some US support for us in this Region, we can make solid cases on all of these issues.”
The former President also observed that since the US President had expressed his intention to withdraw from the climate change deal on his campaign trail, the move should not have come as a surprise to President David Granger, the current Chairman of the Caribbean Community (Caricom). And yet, he noted, Granger and the Region were inactive on the issue.
“We’ve had over six months since the elections in the United States of America and I am yet to see any regional effort to point out to the new Administration in the United States of America about how large a few issues loom in our lives, particularly matters concerning the environment and trade.”
“We knew in Guyana and in the Region that this act – if the US President were to fulfil his (campaign) promise, would be implemented and we’ve practically done very little, if anything at all about this,” the Opposition Leader said.
Jagdeo noted that Granger has been “religiously” promoting the ‘Green State’ initiative at various international events. But he expressed disappointment at the inaction by Guyana and other regional leaders, in advancing policies to ensure the Region gained tangible benefits from the global climate change movement.
Jagdeo also recalled that at the time when Trump, on his campaign trail, had been touting his future plans, he had been urging that a serious attempt be made by the Region to ensure that the nuances of small states and their challenges would not be lost.
Other areas that the former President believes the Government has been negligent on interceding with the US about are the new measures related to Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) and the risk posed by the loss of correspondent banking relations. Already, several Caribbean countries have been adversely affected.
When asked about the situation during a post-Cabinet press conference, Minister of State, Joseph Harmon had described the US pullout as unfortunate. However, he had noted that whatever international movement formed in a bid to fill the void left by the US would overcome the withdrawal.
Commenting on the possibility of more countries pulling out from the agreement, Minister Harmon said it would be a matter of choice for those nations. He added that the agreement was a voluntary one, but declared that Guyana was committed to the global climate change accord.