OECS leaders push back against US pressure to accept third-country deportees
Antigua and Barbuda’s Gaston Browne says his government has offered to take no more than 10 a year, against a US proposal of 120.
ST JOHN’S, Antigua and Barbuda. Leaders of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) meeting in Antigua this week are discussing pressure from the United States to accept deportees from other countries, with some member nations saying they will push back.
Leaders of the seven-member sub-regional grouping say they are increasingly uncomfortable with the pressure to accept relatively large numbers of non-nationals the US wants to send to the region.
Negotiating team proposed
Vincentian Prime Minister Godwin Friday announced plans for a broad-based sub-regional advisory team to lead negotiations with Washington, with an emphasis on limiting the number of deportees sent to member states.
“We are still working through this matter very carefully because it holds serious implications for our economy, the safety of our people, the utilization of scarce resources and for our sovereignty,” he told fellow leaders.
“What may be mere tremors for large nations are experienced as earthquakes by us, small island developing states. We, therefore, suffer the consequences the worst and the longest,” he said.
Browne: ‘No more than 10’
The host, Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne, was more strident, saying his country would resist any large number of non-nationals being sent to live among its people.
The US has proposed sending 10 deportees a month, or 120 a year, but Mr Browne said this was unacceptable because of concerns over security and scarce resources.
“We are not being uncooperative here, but this idea that they could send us 120 individuals, we have said to them this is totally unacceptable. We have sent them a counter-proposal. We said that we’ll accept 10 annually. No more than 10,” he said, describing “the deployment of economic coercion as an instrument of foreign policy.”
Wider region
The discussion comes days after Jamaican officials confirmed the island is also in talks with the US on the issue. Guyana and Dominica have also confirmed negotiations, but none has yet announced any arrivals.
The full slate of CARICOM leaders is expected to meet in St Lucia in early July, where the topic is likely to be discussed in a leaders-only caucus, officials say.
