CARICOM LEADERS TO MULL OVER DEBT REDUCTION AT UPCOMING REGULAR MEETING

(CARICOM Secretariat, Georgetown, Guyana) CARICOM Secretary-General His Excellency Edwin Carrington says the Community will be paying special attention to the deliberations of the meeting of the G-8 countries under the chairmanship of the United Kingdom, being held from the 6 to 8 of July 2005.

Speaking to Journalists in St. Lucia over the weekend at a Media Clinic outlining the Agenda for the Conference of Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), Mr. Carrington said, “some of their concerns, especially their debt relief programmes are of great importance to us not only because Guyana, one of our highly indebted countries is a beneficiary, but also because the preoccupation with Africa raises questions as to what is really left for us.”

The CARICOM Secretary-General stated, “We have in the Caribbean, seven of the ten most indebted countries in the world, and are not, except for Guyana, under consideration for any assistance in their proposals.”

Mr. Carrington said the fact that Caribbean countries are not even being considered for debt relief by the G-8 “means that we have to find another way of solving our indebtedness. We are going to have to trade our way out of debt. But look what has happened to our trade. Sugar, bananas and rum are our big trading items and they have been cut at the knees,” he lamented.

“How are we going to trade our way out of debt? “ he questioned, when “we are the most indebted and are not being given assistance to aid our way out of debt while at the same time, our trading regimes are being undermined”, he said.

Mr. Carrington said these were among the difficult questions that CARICOM Heads of Government are going to have to look at when they meet in St. Lucia on 3-6 July 2005.