EDITORIAL: Strengthening of Barbados/Guyana ‘friendship’ bond

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados - It is of significance and relevance to note that even before last Friday’s historic decision by the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) in the case involving Barbados and the Jamaican Shanique Myrie was publicly made known, the foreign affairs ministers of this country and Guyana had already initiated a plan of action to improve freedom of movement relations between the two CARICOM partner states.
Indeed, in sharp contrast to the unpleasant relations that had lasted for too long between these two over freedom of movement problems, Minister of Foreign Affairs Senator Maxine McClean and her Guyanese counterpart, Carolyn Rodriques-Birkett, have now charted a course of action to ensure arrangements that avoid aggravating immigration problems.
Therefore, the landmark judgment by the CCJ in the Myrie case could well serve as a relevant impetus for the initiative already taken at ministerial level in Georgetown last Friday at the 2nd Guyana-Barbados Joint Commission Meeting.