Caribbean Leaders Question Growing US Air Raids

The United States has launched another strike, this time hitting a vessel just off Venezuela’s coast. Six people were killed in the attack, pushing the death toll from U.S. airstrikes in the region to forty-three since early September. This marks the tenth suspected drug-trafficking boat targeted in recent months, and It’s drawing attention among Caribbean leaders who are questioning the frequency of these operations. So, what does this mean for Belize? We put that question to Foreign Affairs Minister Francis Fonseca. Here’s what he told us.

 

Francis Fonseca, Minister of Foreign Affairs

“We’re  very concerned about these latest actions and the sort of military buildup in the Caribbean Sea. And these, what are extra judicial killings, we have, of course, as a responsible government, we have engaged with our partners and friends in Caricom. So we’re having a discussion about that issue. As you all know, CARICOM issued a very firm statement on the issue expressing our concern. Belize was a part of putting that statement together. So we stand in solidarity with CARICOM on this issue. We are very concerned. We want to ensure that the Caribbean remains a zone of peace that is absolutely critically important to us as a country and to our CARICOM brothers and sisters. And we want to maintain the fundamental principle of international law that, if you suspect that people are trafficking drugs or that they’re engaged in criminal activity, that there’s a process to deal with those individuals. So that there are no unilateral decisions to kill people, as I said, extra judicial killings or militarization of the zone.”