If the con­di­tions are right, the Unit­ed Na­tions (UN) will as­sist in es­tab­lish­ing a roadmap to­wards peace and se­cu­ri­ty for Venezuela and the re­gion.

This was re­vealed in a press re­lease is­sued yes­ter­day by the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter, one day af­ter Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley left Trinidad with For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Den­nis Moses to meet with Unit­ed Na­tions Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al An­to­nio Guter­res at the UN’s head­quar­ters in New York.

Row­ley joined a del­e­ga­tion, led by Cari­com’s chair­man and Prime Min­is­ter of St Kitts and Nevis Dr Tim­o­thy Har­ris, Prime Min­is­ter of Bar­ba­dos Mia Mot­t­ley, Ir­win LaRocque Cari­com’s sec­re­tary gen­er­al and Am­bas­sador for T&T to the UN Pen­ne­lope Beck­les to dis­cuss the on­go­ing ten­sions in Venezuela.

Last Thurs­day, Cari­com Heads of Gov­ern­ment held an emer­gency video con­fer­ence where it was agreed that Har­ris would seek an ur­gent meet­ing with Guter­res to as­sist with the cri­sis in Venezuela where the Gov­ern­ment of Pres­i­dent Nico­las Maduro has been un­der in­ter­na­tion­al pres­sure to step down, while Juan Guai­do had de­clared him­self in­ter­im pres­i­dent of Venezuela.

The on­go­ing po­lit­i­cal ten­sion has re­sult­ed in over two dozen mur­ders, scores be­ing in­jured in protest ac­tion while hun­dreds have fled their home­town to es­cape the coun­try’s mount­ing hard­ships.

The Heads of Gov­ern­ment al­so af­firmed their guid­ing prin­ci­ples of non-in­ter­fer­ence and non-in­ter­ven­tion in the af­fairs of states, re­spect for sov­er­eign­ty, ad­her­ence to the rule of law, re­spect for hu­man rights and democ­ra­cy.

The re­lease stat­ed that Row­ley ex­pressed hope that in the not too dis­tant fu­ture there will be “sig­nif­i­cant im­prove­ment and a di­min­ish­ing of ten­sions in T&T’s neigh­bour­ing ter­ri­to­ry.”

“Com­ing out of the meet­ing the Cari­com del­e­ga­tion is sat­is­fied that if the con­di­tions for such can be met the UN will as­sist in es­tab­lish­ing the roadmap to­wards peace and se­cu­ri­ty for Venezuela and the re­gion,”

In the re­lease, Row­ley added, “We be­lieve in the com­ing days there will be work to­wards di­a­logue so that the in­ter­nal dif­fi­cul­ties in Venezuela can be ap­proached with­out in­ter­ven­tion and in­ter­fer­ence from those who may have a dif­fer­ent ap­proach.”

Last Fri­day, US Am­bas­sador to T&T Joseph Mon­del­lo de­scribed as “deeply con­cern­ing” state­ments com­ing from the T&T Gov­ern­ment recog­nis­ing the “un­de­mo­c­ra­t­ic and il­le­git­i­mate gov­ern­ment of Maduro.

Mon­del­lo said Guai­do and the de­mo­c­ra­t­i­cal­ly elect­ed Na­tion­al As­sem­bly have the full recog­ni­tion and res­olute sup­port of the US and the ma­jor­i­ty of democ­ra­cies in the West­ern Hemi­sphere.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar al­so en­dorsed Guai­do and called for fresh elec­tions in Venezuela su­per­vised by in­ter­na­tion­al ob­servers.

But hours lat­er, Row­ley fired back at Mon­del­lo’s state­ment.

“I take um­brage at the Unit­ed States Am­bas­sador in T&T mak­ing a pub­lic state­ment, crit­i­cis­ing the ac­tions of the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go as we take ac­tion in pro­tec­tion of the in­ter­est of the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go,” Row­ley said.

Last Thurs­day, 16 of 34 na­tions in the Or­gan­i­sa­tions of Amer­i­ca States recog­nised Guai­do at an emer­gency ses­sion.

US Sec­re­tary of State Mike Pom­peo urged mem­bers to op­pose the “il­le­git­i­mate” Maduro and pledged to make US$20 mil­lion avail­able for hu­man­i­tar­i­an as­sis­tance to the coun­try.