The Punch newspaper reports that US Ambassador John Rood has reportedly told Bahamas Prime Minister Perry Christie that the United States is concerned about the cozy relationship developing between the Bahamas and the communist regimes of China, Venezuela and Cuba.
Mr. Rood has suggested that it may be wiser to distance the Bahamas from countries that so oppose US policy. US concerns grew after Trade & Industry Minister Leslie Miller signed an oil and gas supply deal with Venezuela. PM Christie says the deal is not valid because Miller signed it without Cabinet approval. But the deal has upset the US, especially since Venezuela’s leader, Hugo Chavez, seems to have become a self-imposed enemy of the US, while developing close ties with Cuba and communist China.
US officials already expressed concern about the Bahamas’ plans to open an embassy in Cuba. There was also some concern expressed after the media caught the Prime Minister partying with Castro in Cuba. And the ownership of the port in Freeport by the Chinese firm, Hutchinson-Whampoa, allegedly headed by a Chinese gangster, is another big concern for the United States.
Mr. Christie is advised to remember on which side his bread is buttered and by who.
