Did Venezuela ever claim that the Geneva Agreement reversed the Arbitral Award?

Oct 31, 2023 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

---

Kaieteur News – Ralph Ramkarran has made an astonishing statement in his column of last Sunday. He claimed, “ …Venezuela has blatantly lied  about the meaning of the Geneva Agreement. It has argued for decades that the Geneva Agreement reversed the Arbitral Award…”

This is a most interesting revelation. It is hoped that for the benefit of the historical record that Mr. Ramkarran will provide more insights and the evidence to support his contention. His contention would seem to be at odds with two positions adopted by Venezuela. Venezuela had raised questions about the validity of the 1899 award prior to the Geneva Agreement of 1966. Second, Venezuela’s position was that the Geneva Agreement was a political agreement and therefore could not legally nullify the 1899 Arbitral Award.

Ever since the publication of the letter by Severo Mallet-Prèvost in 1949, Venezuela’s position has been that the 1899 Arbitral Award was rigged against it because of a deal among some of the judges. Venezuela described the award as resulting from a political transaction. It argued that the decision of the tribunal provided no legal principles or reasons. Guyana has argued that no evidence has been provided to substantiate the claim that the Award was rigged. Guyana also has compellingly disputed the arguments in relation to the absence of reasons or legal principles in the award. Venezuela’s claim therefore rests on the tenuous contention – for which the evidence is skimpy -that there was a deal that led to the Award.

It was Venezuela’s prior contention that the arbitral award was null and void that became the subject matter of the Geneva Agreement. Venezuela’s approach was that the Geneva Agreement was the basis for negotiations on its territorial claim to Guyana. But Venezuela’s position has always been that the Geneva Agreement cannot adjudicate on the legal merits of the Arbitral Award because the Geneva Agreement is a political agreement and not a legal process. For Venezuela, the Geneva Agreement formed the basis for negotiations to correct what it saw as a historic injustice against it. But having adopted the stance that the Geneva Agreement was a political agreement, it could hardly have taken the stance that the said Geneva Agreement nullified the Arbitral Award.

In its Memorandum to the ICJ, Venezuela referred to the London Conference of 1965. It mentioned that at paragraph 2, ‘the Parties were willing to seek satisfactory formulas for the practical settlement of the dispute regardless of the conclusion they could reach on the validity or nullity of the 1899 award [ emphasis mine]…’

Venezuela has contended that the Geneva Agreement was intended to find a solution to its claim. For Guyana, however, the Geneva Agreement, was not about negotiating over the claim but for finding solutions to the controversy that had arisen because of Venezuela’s claim. The two positions – Venezuela’s and Guyana’s – can be compared to two neighbours having a quarrel as to where the fence separating their properties should lie. The two sides reach an agreement about the process for resolving this matter. One neighbour, Venezuela, is saying that the process should be about deciding where the fence should fall. The other neighbour, Guyana, is saying the process should not be about where the fence should fall but about finding practical solutions to this quarrel between the two sides.

Interestingly, Cheddi Jagan and the PPP- the party to which Mr. Ramkarran belonged for a very long time – held the position that the Geneva Agreement reopened the territorial controversy. But the PNC never conceded this because it would be tantamount to a national betrayal. In rebuttal, those who sided with the PNC’s position, sought to contend that if there was any reopening it was done when the PPPC was in government. This assertion, however has no merit because the position of both the PPP and the British government at the time was that the agreement to examine records was not a reopening of the territorial claim. Indeed, the British was explicit that the opening of the records was merely intended to ensure that Venezuela would be satisfied that it had no claim to Guyana’s territory.

The British and PPP’s government position is substantiated by the Memorandum, Venezuela submitted to the ICJ. It stated at page 8: “The next day (at the 349 session), the representative of the United Kingdom, C.T. Crowe (Doc. A/SPC/72), replied that the case was closed and rejected that there was a pending border issue between Venezuela and the United Kingdom in British Guiana. However, the British representative added that his government, with the consent of Guyana, was willing to discuss with Venezuela through diplomatic channels the arrangements for a tripartite examination of the lengthy documentary material regarding the issue, to “clear any doubt that the Government may continue to have regarding the validity of the award…”

As explained by Cheddi Jagan in Guyana’s National Assembly, “The British Government said over and over, this is a closed case. The PPP Guyana Government took the same position. This is a closed case, but since they were making noise we said, “O.K.” “You think that you have evidence; look at the records.” They went; they looked; they saw nothing. Therefore, having looked, having seen nothing, the answer was to leave everything where it was.” Even if one accepts the PPP’s position that the Geneva Agreement reopened the border dispute, this is quite different from saying that the Venezuelan’s considered that the Geneva Agreement rendered the 1899 the Arbitral Award null and void. Venezuela’s claim to a nullity was because of a dead man’s letter. But perhaps, Mr. Ramkarran will edify us differently.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)

---

• Arbitral Award, Geneva Agreement, historical, Peeping Tom, Venezuela

---