These include preventing Suriname from harassing local fishermen operating in the Corentyne River as well as allowing Guyana to explore and exploit the hydrocarbon and other resources in the area of its maritime territory that Suriname is claiming as its own.

Suriname has indicated that it proposes to challenge the jurisdiction of the arbitral tribunal constituted under Article VII of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea because among other things Guyana and Suriname did not exhaust all the options to reach a settlement of the dispute as mandated by Chapter XV of the Convention. It will also argue that Guyana did not make every effort to arrive at practical arrangements to be put in place pending resolution of the dispute as required by articles 74 and 83 of the Convention, and that some aspects of the dispute were outside the jurisdiction of the tribunal.

But legal observers told Stabroek News that the issue of the provisional orders would be considered of more urgent importance than the jurisdictional challenges and that once the tribunal decides that it can hear the request for the provisional measures it will do so and then issue the necessary orders that it sees fit. They point out too that Suriname could always raise the issue of jurisdiction when the matter is being substantively heard.

Stabroek News understands that the arbitrators for Guyana and Suriname should be meeting shortly to agree on the names of two others and then the four will meet to name a chairman.

Guyana designated Professor Thomas Frank, Professor Emeritus, New York University School of Law as its arbitrator on the five-member panel. Professor Frank is a distinguished international law scholar and practitioner who has served as a judge ad hoc of the International Court of Justice.

Suriname has designated Professor Hans Smit as its arbitrator.