Essequibo crisis: Guyana says oil producers moving ahead despite Venezuela’s threats
- Venezuela warned ExxonMobil, others to leave disputed seas near vast oil-rich Essequibo region
- Maduro revives old border claim, putting Brazil on high alert about possibility of an armed conflict in region
Oil majors operating in Guyana’s waters are “moving ahead aggressively” with production plans despite Venezuela’s threats to take over the region in an escalating border conflict, according to President Irfaan Ali.
Speaking from Georgetown, Ali said Guyana’s troops are prepared to defend the nation’s territory after Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro revived a long-dormant dispute over the Essequibo, a swathe roughly the size of Florida where major oil discoveries have been made in recent years.
Companies operating there were not intimidated by orders from the Venezuelan leader to leave the region, he added.
“There’s absolutely no slowing down” in production plans, Ali said in a video interview on Monday. “We are on the right side of international law, on the right side of ethics, and on the right side of history.”
Maduro last week told ExxonMobil and others to withdraw from the area within three months, leaving Brazil and other Latin American nations on high alert about the possibility of an armed conflict in the region.
