ST JOHN’S, Antigua (CMC) — Prime Minister Gaston Browne says the Antigua and Barbuda Government changed its intended support for a United Nations resolution concerning Cuba following a warning from the United States about the possible effect on the ongoing negotiations regarding visa for nationals wanting to visit the North American country.

“In fact, I’ll make this public. We had decided to support Cuba on a resolution recently and change our position because we had a call from the State Department advising us that they’re making progress in the negotiations and if we supported Cuba, that it would undermine the negotiations, so we changed our position,” Browne told listeners to his weekly radio programme last weekend.

“Our instructions to the ambassador in New York was to abstain. I noticed he did not show up, I don’t know what happened, but we changed our position because of certain things that were said and we’re still trying, but it’s not something we have any control over,” he added.

Of the Caribbean Community (Caricom) countries that were present at the October 28 debate, Jamaica, Haiti, and Guyana abstained, while Trinidad and Tobago voted against. The Bahamas, Belize, Barbados, Grenada, St Vincent and the Grenadines, St Kitts and Nevis, and Suriname, all voted in favour of the resolution, while Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, and St Lucia were marked as being absent when the vote was taken.

Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar has since doubled down on her Government’s decision to support the United States trade and economic embargo against Cuba, saying “We cannot want to live in light at home and remain silent when others live in the shadows of oppression and exploitation”.

Browne’s statement on the vote at the United Nations came as a female caller said she is unable to travel to the United States to be with her ailing mother, because her current visa had expired and that securing one remained difficult.

“I have said time and time again that there is no justification for it because, you know, we have had very good relations with the United States. We have never done anything to offend them, so up to this day, we’re not quite sure,” he said.

Browne wondered whether the US position is being guided by the Citizenship by Investment Programme through which foreign investors are granted citizenship of the island in return for making a substantial investment in the country’s socio-economic development.

He said if that was the case, his Government had just agreed to suspend the programme and had informed the European Union about that position in writing.

“…but we asked them to give us an additional three and a half years, we’re waiting to hear from them,” he said.

“So after the official suspension
— which obviously is a phase-out over three and a half years, but an agreement to suspend from now, literally from November 12th
— we will write to them again and let them know that we have formally suspended our programme because that’s the reason that they use,” he said.