NASSAU, Bahamas — The Office of the Prime Minister has confirmed that Prime Minister the Most Hon. Dr. Hubert Minnis will be a part of a CARICOM prime ministerial fact-finding mission to Haiti to inform regional leaders on the situation in that country.
Noting that CARICOM leaders are concerned about the escalation of violence in Haiti, the statement from the Prime Minister’s office said the fact-finding mission will also include the prime ministers of St. Lucia and Jamaica.
“The decision was taken at the Caribbean Community’s 40th annual Heads of Government Meeting held in Gros Islet, St. Lucia, 3-5 July,” the statement said
The Prime Minister returned to The Bahamas on Saturday, Saturday, July 6, following discussions with regional leaders that covered such issues as tourism, finance, blacklisting, the Caribbean economy, and the Small Island Development States (SIDS) Resilience Foundation.
The Haiti ministerial meeting was reported in the Jamaica Gleaner on Friday, July 5, in an article distributed by Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC)
“We discussed that issue and what we said is that we will have a high-level delegation, comprising prime ministers who will go to Haiti on a fact-finding mission,” Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne told CMC.
Browne said that the regional leaders, while meeting in St Lucia for their annual summit, expressed concern about the developments unfolding in the French-speaking CARICOM country.
“We are concerned about the escalation of violence in Haiti and CARICOM will be going there to find out what the situation is on the ground and at the same time to come up with recommendations to resolve the issues amicably,” he said.
Browne said that it is likely that the mission “would include the St Lucia Prime Minister Allen Chastanet, the CARICOM chairman, as well as the prime ministers of Jamaica and The Bahamas,” the CMC article said.
“Those are the three that would have volunteered so far,” Browne said, adding that the date would most likely be set “mutually between the government of Haiti and the CARICOM team.”
Manwhile, it was also announced by St. Lucia’s Prime Minister Allen Chastanet that a Florida-Caribbean conference will take place in the United States in December aimed at integrating the region’s lobbying efforts in Washington, D.C.
Prime Minister Allen Chastanet told a news conference in St. Lucia that the initiative had been discussed and endorsed by regional leaders during the annual CARICOM summit that ended in St. Lucia on July 5.
“The Governor of Florida, the Senators of Florida, the Congresspersons, both of the Democrat and the Republican Parties, and also the Mayor of Miami have endorsed this conference,” Prime Minister Chastanet was quoted as saying in the St. Kitts and Nevis Observer on July 7.
“The expectation is that at a very high level that we can start integrating with the Florida politicians and assist us in our lobbying efforts in Washington,” Chastanet said, defending the choice of Florida “because it is a state where we have the greatest amount of economic impact.”
“In fact, almost 80 cents of every dollar that a US tourist spends in our region goes back to America and so between the airlines, cruise ships, the same natural disasters that are affecting us are also affecting Florida,” he said
Chastanet said the same issues and sources of crime with regards to drug trafficking “are coming in the same region, so there are a lot of synergies to be had by both groups in terms of working together and I guess the last one, which is a critical one, is that the Caribbean diaspora is significant in Florida.”
