The Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, expressed her support for the deployment of military forces in Caribbean waters near her country
The destroyer USS Gravely, of the United States Navy, arrived this Sunday, October 26, in Trinidad and Tobago to carry out military exercises for several days, as part of Washington’s naval deployment in the Caribbean Sea.
The distance of the island of Trinidad from the Venezuelan coast is just 11 kilometers at its closest point.
The ship anchored at a Port of Spain dock at around 9:00 am under tight security measures, he testified. EFE.
In addition to the destroyer, the arrival of the 22nd Expeditionary Unit of the US Marine Corps is expected.
The vice president of the Trinidad and Tobago Red Cross, Edward Moodie, highlighted in statements to EFE that the visit of the destroyer “should strengthen collaboration and not confrontation.”
“Our goal must be to protect lives and ensure that humanitarian and security efforts go hand in hand,” he added.
For her part, the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, expressed on Saturday her support for the deployment of military forces in Caribbean waters near her country.
«Trinidad and Tobago remains a sovereign state, committed to peace and cooperation. The visit of the USS Gravely is part of that constant security collaboration in the fight against transnational crime,” he said.
And although Moodie stressed that the arrival of the destroyer is not for “confrontation,” for several weeks now, the United States, under orders of its president, Donald Trump, has deployed military units, especially to Puerto Rico, to carry out exercises and operations against drug trafficking in the Caribbean Sea.
Even last Friday, the Pentagon announced the deployment of the aircraft carrier USS Gerald Ford in those watersthe largest in the US fleet, in the midst of tension with Venezuela due to military attacks against boats apparently loaded with drugs.
The United States has mobilized military ships, a submarine and fighter planes for operations against drug trafficking, which so far have left 43 dead in ten bombings of suspected drug boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific.
It is expected that both the ship and the other troops will remain in Trinidad and Tobago until Thursday, October 30, to do their training with the local Defense Force, as announced by the Trinidadian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
However, 10 former leaders of the Caribbean Community (Caricom) expressed their concern about the increase in military troops, nuclear ships and US aircraft in the area, as they pose a threat to the security and well-being of its inhabitants.
The respective former presidents of Jamaica and Saint Lucia, Bruce Golding and PJ Patterson, and Kenny Anthony, and the prime ministers of Belize, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada and Saint Lucia, Said Musa and Dean Barrow, Baldwin Spencer, Freundel Stuart, Edison James and Tillman Thomas, respectively, make up the group.
“The ‘peace zone’ has been codified and has become a cornerstone in the architecture of Caribbean sovereignty and the axis for our relationship with the countries of our hemisphere, Europe and the rest of the world,” they expressed.
With information from EFE
*Journalism in Venezuela is carried out in a hostile environment for the press with dozens of legal instruments in place to punish the word, especially the laws “against hate”, “against fascism” and “against the blockade.” This content was written taking into consideration the threats and limits that, consequently, have been imposed on the dissemination of information from within the country.
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