Demilitarized zone (DMZ)
Editorial
Stabroek News
January 3, 2003
There was something of a furore in Suriname's National Assembly last September as members accused President Ronald Venetiaan's Administration of inaction over alleged Guyanese military manoeuvres in the New River Zone.
Some assemblymen referred to Guyana's President Bharrat Jagdeo's public admission at a press conference in Paramaribo last January, during his official visit to Suriname, that Guyanese troops were based at the location which Surinamese call Tigri. The Surinamese claimed, correctly, that an agreement had been reached between Guyana and Suriname for the zone to be demilitarized. They made intemperate calls for military action to "clear up the southern triangle", by force if necessary, before Suriname's Independence Day on 25 November.
Both President Venetiaan and Defence Minister Ronald Assen had to counsel the Assembly, one against considering a violent course of action to resolve an international dispute, the other against rushing to judgement without sufficient or correct evidence. Admitting that Guyanese troops were in the so-called demilitarized zone (DMZ), Mr. Assen denied that there was any increase in activities. He even admitted to having asked a large neighbouring country to use its resources to determine whether there were unusual military movements in the zone.
The bone of contention in the National Assembly was the 'Chaguaramas Agreement' reached between Prime Ministers Forbes Burnham of Guyana and Jules Sedney of Suriname on 10 April 1970 at Crow's Nest, Chaguaramas, Trinidad. That agreement was confirmed two months later, during Dr Sedney's official visit to Georgetown, when the two Prime Ministers declared in a 'Joint Statement', thus:
"They recognized the importance of achieving demilitarisation as rapidly as possible and, with this in view, and in the spirit of friendship and understanding that characterized their discussions and motivated the policies of their Governments, the Prime Ministers agreed upon the immediate demilitarisation, by both countries of their respective presences in the region...The Prime Minister of Guyana indicated to the Prime Minister of Surinam that pursuant to their meeting in Trinidad and Tobago and even prior to the meeting of the Working Party on demilitarisation, his Government had taken steps to withdraw military personnel from a number of points in the region of the Upper Corentyne. With the removal of remaining Guyana and Surinam military personnel from the region which the Prime Ministers agreed to undertake forthwith, the demilitarization envisaged in their Communiqué of April 1970 would have been effected."
Guyana did, indeed, comply faithfully with the Chaguaramas Agreement. GDF troops who had occupied the Zone since August 1969 were withdrawn and a civilian settlement was established in its place. There was no evidence, however, that the Suriname Armed Forces did the same. Indeed, in clear violation of the Chaguaramas Agreement, Suriname continued to maintain troops on Coeroeni Island which is located in the disputed Corentyne River.
Afterwards, the Guyana Government attempted to establish a civilian agricultural settlement which, eventually, was abandoned. The Guyana National Service (GNS) then assumed responsibility for establishing a new civilian settlement but the GNS itself was disbanded by the present Administration and responsibility for the zone reverted to the GDF, hence President Jagdeo's admission.
The fact that 32 years after the Chaguaramas Agreement the occupation of the demilitarized zone is still being hotly discussed in Suriname's National Assembly certainly is more than a matter of historical interest.
Conflict over the zone had erupted since 1967 when a detachment of the Guyana Police Force (GPF) had to expel 40 Surinamese surveyors who had been conducting exploration there and occupied a camp near to the confluence of the Oronoque and New Rivers. Shortly afterwards, aerial surveillance established evidence that a new site, which the Surinamese called 'Tigri', had been fortified into a well-defended camp with barracks, bunkers, and buildings capable of accommodating about 50 soldiers. An aerodrome was also in the process of being completed. The GDF was obliged to conduct an assault on 19 August 1969 to expel the Surinamese from Guyanese territory.
Surinamese seemed to have been better informed about the background to the territorial controversy than Guyanese and, for Suriname, sovereignty over the Corentyne River, New River Zone and the Atlantic disputed area are linked. So, although the presidential press conference in 2002 may have seemed to be a great distance away from the CGX issue in 2000, when President Jagdeo was asked about the presence of Guyana's military forces in the New River Zone, without an interpreter of his staff, and responding to questions explained to him by the bilingual President Ronald Venetiaan, he readily admitted to that. The Surinamese were incensed.
Suriname links Guyana's request to reach an agreement on petroleum exploration in the disputed Atlantic zone with the issue of the DMZ and it should not surprise the Guyana side to learn that the former will never be settled without the latter.
This has been Suriname's unchanging policy for at least 32 years and was unlikely to change in 32 weeks.
