Belize and Guatemala Hold High-Level Talks on Regional Security

Security and Defence Ministers from Belize and Guatemala attended a high-level meeting on Monday to discuss regional security cooperation.  Minister of Defence and Border Security Oscar Mira and Minister of Home Affairs Kareem Musa led the Belize delegation to Guatemala to meet with their counterparts. Minister Musa told Love News that while much of the details is classified, a major focus of the meeting was about cooperation to tackle the issue of trans-national crime. Perhaps most important is the discussion of the continuous incursions by Guatemalans into Belize.

Kareem Musa, Minister of Home Affairs: “We had a historic meeting in Guatemala on Monday of this week. It was a security meeting so a lot of it is highly confidential and it is in its early phases of development. We were able to meet with our counterparts the Guatemalan Minister of the Interior and the Guatemalan Minister of Defense as well as the Minister of Foreign Affairs for Guatemala. I have to say that the meeting went exceptionally well. Of course Belize continues to register the fact that we are not appreciative of any incursions when it comes to the Sarstoon so we always make sure to register that as well as cooperative mechanisms that can be put in place similar to what we have on our western border at Arenal. We have a monthly linkup with our Guatemalan counterparts both the BDF and the police and we want to replicate that similar type of agile cooperation in the south of our country and Guatemala is extremely open to that idea. So the broader topics of course is to ensure that our territorial integrity is respected while at the same time making avenues for greater information sharing. As you know a lot of the illicit aircraft coming into our country ver the last four or five years have been in the south of our country and the drugs eventually make their way into the Guatemala territory. So working together in terms of the intelligence gathering and intelligence sharing is extremely important. So that’s a mechanism that we’re going to be putting in place.”

Commissioner of Police Dr. Richard Rosado and high-ranking personnel from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs were also part of the delegation.