Everybody seems to be making heavy weather of the upcoming meeting between United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and a number of Caricom government ministers. The meeting is planned for New York on Monday and is in a way a sidebar to the current session of the United Nations General Assembly.
But what really is there to gain from this meeting? The Bush Administration has, certainly in this second term, almost completely forgotten about this part of the world, except when hurricanes threaten, then we get mentioned in a geographical sense.
We are wary of this meeting. We believe it is really cosmetic, because eight months ago Ms. Rice met with Caricom foreign ministers in the Bahamas and we are yet to hear of anything concrete coming out of those discussions. Oh! There are always promises and plans. What will be done and how it will improve relations between the Caribbean and ﾓbig brotherﾒ up north, except nothing ever materialises.
Source: The Antigua Sun
