Emmanuel Macron is not far away, he who ends a visit to Guyana this Tuesday, March 26 before heading to Brazil. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Stéphane Séjourné, was in neighboring Guyana on Monday. On this occasion, the Quai d’Orsay announced in a press release that France will open an embassy in this small country.
French diplomacy welcomes this opening, “a first for a member country of the European Union”. “In a desire for rapprochement between neighboring and friendly countries, Guyana and France have decided to write a new chapter in their history by opening a French embassy in Georgetown in 2025,” confided a source close to the Guyanese government.
Stéphane Séjourné had discussions “under the sign of major international crisis issues (Haiti, Ukraine, Middle East)” with Guyanese President Irfaan Ali and his Guyanese counterpart Hugh Todd, according to the French press release. “The minister knows that he can find in Guyana an interlocutor to advance the efforts of the international community to resolve these crises,” insists the Quai, which specifies that this is the first time that a French Minister of Foreign Affairs goes to Guyana.
Lots of oil in Guyana
Guyana, a small country rich in oil reserves and close to French Guiana, chairs the Caribbean Community (Caricom), in the midst of a security and political crisis in Haiti. He is also an elected member of the UN Security Council.
This decision “is also part of France’s diplomatic rearmament”, specifies the Quai d’Orsay, after the announcements concerning “an embassy in Samoa, a consulate general in Mosul and Melbourne and the creation of 700 additional posts of here 2027 for French diplomacy.”
For the moment, the French embassy in Suriname, a former Dutch colony located between French Guiana and Guyana, also covers Guyana, where a charge d’affaires works.
A country of 800,00 inhabitants, Guyana has seen its importance increase with the discovery of significant deposits which make it the first country in the world in oil reserves per capita. Guyana and Venezuela dispute the disputed and oil-rich Essequibo region.
This article is originally published on .huffingtonpost.fr
