BRIDGETOWN, Barbados – The Opposition St Lucia Labour Party (SLP) has called on Prime Minister Sir John Compton’s Government to “speedily end the uncertainty” of the country’s diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China following its rise to power at the December 11, 2006 general election.

The SLP, led by former Prime Minister Dr Kenny Anthony, said in a press statement that this delay in regularising normal relations with China, which has an embassy in Castries, was the direct result of the long and close links that Compton’s UWP had maintained with Taiwan with which the party had diplomatic ties while in government.

While Prime Minister Compton has remained silent on St Lucia/China relations, the Chinese embassy itself has expressed concerns over the Government’s “delayed process” for the signing of a “memorandum of understanding on continued relations’, as would be normal with a change in administration.

In its statement to the media on Friday, the SLP said that “it would be a retrograde step if St Lucia were to abandon ties with the People’s Republic of China, especially since China is now seen as one of the world’s fastest growing economies and in the context where most of the Caribbean countries have broken ties with Taiwan…”

Currently, only three Caricom states – Belize, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and St Kitts and Nevis – have relations with Taiwan, officially regarded by China as a “renegade province” of the mainland.