Relations good despite no ambassador
- Venezuelan Charge-d'affaires
Stabroek News
December 23, 2003
Venezuela is likely to consider appointing a new ambassador to Guyana once its national budget for the coming year is approved. The embassy here has been without an ambassador since July 2002 when Ambassador Jean Francis Pulvenis left the post.
Charge-d'affaires, Fernando Rincon told Stabroek News that the delay in the appointment of a new ambassador does not signal any deterioration in the relations between his country and Guyana: "Sometimes it is not easy to find the right person who wants to go to a particular place."
Rincon added that there were a number of constraints last year including the general strike that imposed some financial constraints in making these appointments.
He explained that Guyana was not the only important post that had been without an ambassador and cited as examples diplomatic missions in Saudi Arabia and Iran, members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) that until recently had been without ambassadors.
An official source has told Stabroek News that notwithstanding the desirability of having an ambassador appointed, once there is a Charge d'affaires a.i. appointed to act as head of mission it is business as usual. The official noted too that the absence of an ambassador did not prevent Venezuelan Foreign Minister Roy Chadderton from visiting Guyana earlier this year.
Observers have noted that the absence of a Guyana ambassador to the People's Republic of China has not prevented a substantial amount of aid flowing from Beijing to Georgetown. The Guyana mission in Beijing has been without an ambassador for almost ten years.