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Venezuela rejects World Court decision on border
…insists on negotiating directly with Guyana
Venezuela president, Nicolas Maduro
Kaieteur News – Last week, the United Nation’s judicial arm, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) handed down a key decision stating that it has jurisdiction to hear a matter in a border case Guyana filed against neighbouring Venezuela.
Venezuela has been laying claims for years now on a large swath of mineral-rich Essequibo and Guyana’s waters.
In 2015, the Nicolas Maduro administration even drew maps claiming the waters where US-owned ExxonMobil discovered oil.
Guyana, after frustration for years using a Good Office process, filed a court case in 2018.
Venezuela has not participated in the matter.
Following the ruling last week by ICJ that it has jurisdiction, Venezuela released its own statement, rejecting the decision.
According to Venezuela’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Monday, they want to negotiate directly with Guyana.
The statement is below:
“The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela has been made aware of the decision of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), read in a hearing by video conference on December 18, 2020, in relation to the unilateral claim filed by the Cooperative Republic of Guyana against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela on the validity of the Arbitration Award of 1899.
In this regard, the following is reported to the national and international community:
The Geneva Agreement is the only restrictive bilateral regulation in force, applicable to settle, through friendly negotiations, the territorial dispute. The foregoing denies the judicial route, incapable of reaching the practical and satisfactory settlement that this Treaty imposes on both parties. In that sense, Venezuela has been and is willing to engage in these friendly negotiations to reach a mutually satisfactory settlement.
By deciding that it has jurisdiction over the validity of the 1899 arbitration award based on Guyana’s unilateral claim, the ICJ commits an incomprehensible and unusual error, not only in terms of the consent not given by Venezuela to said jurisdiction, but by admitting a object of dispute other than the substantial object of the dispute, as defined by the 1966 Geneva Agreement.
With its decision, the Court not only violates its own doctrine established and sustained for decades, but also its extensive jurisprudence. Consequently, Venezuela rejects the decision of the ICJ, in perfect accordance with the arguments that it opportunely offered – from its sovereign position of not appearing – to assist with it in its duty to issue a pronouncement where the law, the principles of Law and customary law required him to declare his obvious lack of jurisdiction.
Consequently, and for the reasons set forth above, the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela repudiates the ruling issued by the ICJ in the aforementioned terms, while claiming, once again, the validity of the 1966 Geneva Agreement and ratifying that it will continue to exercise their just claim, given the grotesque fraud that the Arbitration Award of 1899 implied to the detriment of their territorial integrity.
Finally, Venezuela reiterates its call for this controversy to be channeled amicably and proposes the beginning of direct negotiations with the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, in accordance with international law and on the basis of the 1966 Geneva Agreement, which mandates both parties to resolve this dispute peacefully.
The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela calls on all the Venezuelan people to unite around this national historical cause in the defence of their sovereign right over Guayana Esequiba (sic) and to reject a decision that is detrimental to law, history and justice.
The sun of Venezuela rises in the Essequibo.
Caracas, December 18, 2020”
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