The national interest

Apr 09, 2017 APNU Column, Features / Columnists

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(Address by HE David Granger to the Conference of Heads of Mission – April 4, 2017)

Guyana is a small state. Small states usually lack the economic, geographic and strategic power to

impose their will on other states in the contentious and confrontational amphitheatre of international relations. Small states, therefore, must pursue their ‘national interest’ through the practice of diplomacy in the international system.
Diplomats’ work is impelled by the imperatives of their countries’ ‘national interest’. The images on Carifesta Avenue in Georgetown tell the tale of where those interests lie. The flag and coat of arms of each Caribbean Community member state displayed there, remind us that everyone knows that he or she is a citizen of a country and that country is a constituent of the Caribbean Community.
An analogous impression is conveyed by the monument to the slaughter of Guyanese citizens in the Cubana terrorist massacre on the University’s Turkeyen campus. Eleven Guyanese ‘citizens’, among the 73 passengers, were blasted out of the sky off the coast of Barbados on 6th October 1976.
The Cubana de Aviación flight CU 455 had originated in Guyana. It flew to Trinidad and then to Barbados with the intention of heading to Jamaica before terminating in Cuba. The Anglophone Caribbean became, thereby, the theatre of the deadliest terrorist attack in the western hemisphere up to that time.
It was no coincidence that the Prime Ministers of the same four Anglophone Caribbean states – Barbados’s Errol Barrow, Guyana’s Forbes Burnham, Jamaica’s Michael Manley and Trinidad and Tobago’s Eric Williams – had made the courageous decision to establish diplomatic relations with Cuba in December 1972.
The states’ diplomatic démarche, most likely, might have made their citizens targets of international terrorism. Their Caribbean identity was inseparable from their countries’ foreign policy. Cubana was a bloody introduction to regional realpolitik.
The erection of the CARICOM Secretariat, the embellishment of Carifesta Avenue, the observance of CARICOM Day as a national holiday and the construction of the Cubana Monument are not irrelevant relics of our collective historical consciousness. They are expressive of the ‘national interest’. They illustrate the state’s world view – weltanschauung – at the levels of citizen, country and community, all at once. They define, to a degree, the duty of diplomats.
The recognition of the importance of citizenship is vital to the ‘national interest’. A country is made up of citizens – persons recognized under the law as legal members of a sovereign state – who are entitled to the protection of that state. It is because of the importance of the principle of citizenship that we established a ‘Ministry of Citizenship’ in 2015. It is important to be Guyanese, to be Caribbean. No one should be ‘stateless.’
It is relevant to cite what has been described as “…the greatest debate on the principles of foreign policy…” in British parliamentary records. The British Foreign Secretary, Lord Palmerston, delivered an address in defence of his foreign policy in the House of Commons in June 1850.The debate centred on a demand for compensation for losses sustained by two British subjects.
One, David Pacifico, a Gibraltar-born Jew and a British citizen, had claimed British assistance for compensation against the Greek government for damage to his property caused during anti-Semitic riots in Athens. The ‘Don Pacifico’ affair, and the ‘civis Romanus sum’ principle which Palmerston explicated, became symbols of British support for liberal constitutional progress and for a citizen’s right to the protection of the state.
The state of Guyana has an obligation to extend its protection to every citizen. The enormous size, extensive dispersal and enthusiastic patriotism of the diaspora are assets to be prized. The rights of the citizen are important to the ‘national interest.’
The protection and projection of Guyana’s sovereignty are essential elements of Guyana’s diplomacy. Guyana lacks both the economic strength to sanction other states and the military capability to extend its power beyond its borders. A small state, notwithstanding its limitations, can seek to influence international relations in order to achieve its foreign policy objectives.
Guyana’s involvement in the United Nations Mission in Haiti (UNMIH) which assisted in the restoration of democratic government in Haiti (1994-96); its generous assistance to Grenada in the aftermath of Hurricane Ivan (2004); and its gratuitous training of cadets from the Belize and other Caribbean Defence Forces, are examples of our defence diplomacy.
Guyana, the only English-speaking country on the continent of South America, projects itself as a Caribbean country with continental characteristics. It can influence international relations by exploiting its geo-strategic advantage.
It is part of the vast Guiana Shield and has defined itself as an advocate for the environment. The establishment of the 371,000-hectare Iwokrama International Centre for Rainforest Conservation and Development (IICRCD) – an area larger than Malta or Mauritius – is the exemplification of efforts to extend the protected areas system, to protect our biodiversity and to exercise environmental stewardship. Guyana is set to become a ‘Green State’ – a global exemplar of environmental sanity and security.
The strengthening of the Caribbean Community is vital to Guyana’s economy and security. Guyana’s first Prime Minister, Forbes Burnham, addressing the United Nations General Assembly in September 1966 – Independence year – said, of Guyana’s relations with the Caribbean:
… we devote every effort to the strengthening of Caribbean unity, the
development and maintenance of regional cooperation and integration
at all levels and the building of a strong viable Caribbean community.
Guyana has sought the protection of the international community in the face of threats to its security. Survival is a primary concern of small states which are vulnerable to security threats. The United Nations General Assembly Resolution (A/RES/49/31) of 1994 called on the Security Council and other relevant organs of the United Nations “to pay special attention to the protection and security of small States…”
Guyana has consistently elicited assurances of solidarity and support for its sovereignty and territorial integrity from the Caribbean Community, the Commonwealth and other international organisations.
An essential element of Guyana’s foreign policy has to be a strong commitment to regionalism. Guyana’s early diplomatic exertions extended to the establishment of the Caribbean Free Trade Area (CARIFTA) and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM).
These were followed by entry into the Association of Caribbean States (ACS); Community of Latin American States (CELAC); Organisation of American States (OAS); Union of South American States (UNASUR) and others. Membership of international organisations reinforces collective security and, hence the pursuit of the ‘national interest.’
Guyana’s Foreign Service, with its exemplary experience of diplomacy, is charged with the pursuit of the ‘national interest’ at three levels – the citizen, the country and the international and regional community.

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