Guyana investigates attack on six soldiers on Venezuelan border

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San Juan, (EFE). – Guyana’s President Irfaan Ali said Tuesday that Guyanese authorities are investigating an attack on six soldiers on the Cuyuni River, in the north near the Venezuelan border.

“We are taking this very seriously, (…) even if it is an armed gang or one of those organizations that operate on the Venezuelan side of the border, this is serious because they fired on ranks in uniform,” President Ali said.

The Guyana Defense Force said the soldiers were allegedly ambushed on Monday by masked gunmen from the Venezuelan side.

The six Guyanese soldiers were taken to a hospital for treatment.

“Let us get the assessment, and then we will discuss our procedure, which is important for the protection of our men and women in uniform and also our sovereignty,” Ali said.

Guyana’s army chief, Omar Khan, said two of the wounded soldiers were in critical condition.

The GDF said it responded immediately to the attack and engaged the assailants.

The attack comes amid a territorial dispute between Venezuela and Guyana over the Essequibo, an area of approximately 160,000 square kilometers.

The dispute escalated after Venezuela approved a unilateral referendum in December 2023 to annex the region, which Guyana has controlled since 1966 and whose dispute is in the hands of the International Court of Justice.

At the beginning of February, Venezuela described the Essequibo as an area of “very high strategic importance” and said that a Venezuelan authority would be elected in this area “for the first time” in the regional elections on April 27.

For Guyana, the declaration violates the Argyle Agreement signed on Dec. 14, 2023, in the presence of international mediators, which commits both nations to refrain from escalating any conflict or disagreement arising from the territorial dispute.

The dispute over the Essequibo, which makes up two-thirds of Guyana’s territory and has been claimed by Venezuela for more than a century, began with the Paris Arbitration Award of 1899, which granted sovereignty over the area to what was then British Guiana.

Decades later, Venezuela declared the award null and void and signed the Geneva Agreement of 1966 with the United Kingdom, which established a commission to resolve the historic dispute, but it never materialized.

Guyana, which cites the 1899 award, is committed to resolving the territorial dispute through the process initiated at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). EFE

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