Tillerson’s Jamaica visit will divide CARICOM, Unless… Ambassador Curtis A. Ward While Secretary Rex Tillerson’s scheduled visit to Jamaica has been received with some level of scepticism, any visit by a U.S. Secretary of State to Jamaica should be welcome news. Ordinarily, such visits are expressions of good working relationships, and often used to strengthen ties even further. On the other hand, there are also visits by U.S. Secretaries of State which are triggered by disagreements on...
Conversation with Earl Jarrett – CEO of JN Group and Chair of Jamaica 55 Diaspora Conference 2017 Ambassador Curtis A. Ward, Host – CaribNation TV (20 Sept. 2017) — In a wide-ranging conversation on the role and importance of the Jamaican Diaspora to Jamaica, Mr. Earl Jarrett, CEO of JN Group, who was chairman of the Jamaica 55 Diaspora Conference 2017, provided an approach which should find resonance with members of the Diaspora; and which offers specific ideas for the way...
P.J. Patterson, In His Own Words – Interview with CaribNation TV I sat down as CaribNation TV Host with the Most Honorable P. J. Patterson, former Prime Minister of Jamaica at his New Kingston Office in Jamaica in July 2017 for a conversation which covered a broad range of issues. This conversation with the former Jamaican Prime Minister occured while the Jamaica 55 Diaspora Conference 2017 was underway at the Jamaica Conference Centre in Kingston, attended by over a thousand Jamaicans...
Implementing the U.S.-Caribbean Strategic Engagement Act Ambassador Curtis A. Ward (21 July 2017) — As pointed out by Representative Eliot L. Engel (D-NY), Ranking Member of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, in his opening remarks at the Committee’s hearing on implementation of the U.S.-Caribbean Strategic Engagement Act of 2016 – Public Law No: 114-291 (the Act) on July 19, 2017, having received the U.S. Strategy for Engagement in the Caribbean (the Strategy) report submitted...
Caribbean Response to COVID-19 Conversation Hosted by Ambassador Curtis Ward for CaribNation TV and The Ward Post Special Guests: Dr. Joy St. John, Executive Director, Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA); Dr. Douglas Slater, CARICOM Assistant Secretary General – Human and Social Development; Professor Dr. Clive Landis, Chairman, University of the West Indies COVID-19 Task Force This discussion explores the many important ways Caribbean regional institutions are...
Caribbean Diaspora aroused demonstrating discontent Ambassador Curtis A. Ward (04 December 2019) — Discontent within Caribbean diaspora communities is growing in intensity. To most governments in the region, peaceful demonstrations on the streets far removed from the homeland are viewed as non-threatening and inconsequential, thus easily ignored and dismissed. But they should take heed! What they see is only the tip of the iceberg. Traditionally, diaspora’s passionate patriotism has...
Collateral Damage from Trump’s Actions Destabilize Caribbean Countries Ambassador Curtis A. Ward (13 May 2018) –In just under 16 months of President Donald Trump’s administration, actions taken by the American president are sending shock waves across the Caribbean and the world. Unintended consequences – collateral damage – from U.S. actions threaten to destabilize the fragile economies and security of Caribbean countries. The Trump storm is creating new dynamics in geopolitical...
Tillerson’s Jamaica visit will divide CARICOM, Unless… Ambassador Curtis A. Ward While Secretary Rex Tillerson’s scheduled visit to Jamaica has been received with some level of scepticism, any visit by a U.S. Secretary of State to Jamaica should be welcome news. Ordinarily, such visits are expressions of good working relationships, and often used to strengthen ties even further. On the other hand, there are also visits by U.S. Secretaries of State which are triggered by disagreements on...
Trump’s security assistance cuts and Pompeo’s Jamaica promises diverge Ambassador Curtis A. Ward (25 February 2020) — On the 10th anniversary of the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI), former president Barack Obama’s signature security assistance partnership with the Caribbean, president Donald Trump’s Fiscal Year 2021 (FY21) budget cut proposal undermines the bold promises made by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during his recent visit to Jamaica. Even as Pompeo was in...
Questions I would have asked Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness Ambassador Curtis A. Ward (29 Nov. 2018) — As a Host of CaribNation TV, I requested an interview with Jamaican Prime Minister the Most Hon. Andrew Holness to take place during his visit to Washington DC from November 25-29, 2018. With the expectation that I would have the opportunity to sit down with the Prime Minister, I was asked to submit the subject areas for the interview which I provided in great detail. I was...
Trinidad & Tobago Faces Terrorist Threat Ambassador Curtis A. Ward It came as no surprise when news broke that U.S. intelligence services had warned the Government of Trinidad & Tobago (Trinidad) of plots to carry out terrorist attacks during Trinidad’s Carnival 2018 celebrations. Trinidad has been vulnerable for years and successive governments have failed to undertake necessary and timely action to ensure that the country has in place appropriate laws, and administrative and...
Putin’s aggression in Ukraine: Lessons from Milosevic and the Balkans Ambassador Curtis A. Ward Many of the images we see in Ukraine today are reminiscent of the horrors we saw during the Balkans wars of the 1990s, only worse. While the Balkans wars were a complex series of conflicts involving ethnic cleansing and independence driven insurgencies which resulted in break up of the former Yugoslavia into newly independent states in Europe, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is an act of aggression...
Dying for Freedom and Democracy Ambassador Curtis A. Ward (25 April 2022) —The people of Ukraine took to the streets in massive protests (2013-2014), known as the Maidan protests, to demand democracy, freedom, and good governance over autocracy, political oppression, and corruption. They succeeded. But their success rattled other autocracies in Europe and around the world. The world’s top autocrat, Russian president Vladimir Putin was rattled and determined to reverse the trend...
Reform UN Security Council and strengthen international order Ambassador Curtis A. Ward (17 April 2022) — Calling for reform of the UN Security Council (Council) is not new and did not originate with the Russian invasion of Ukraine. However, this illegal invasion and the egregious accompanying actions of the Russian military bring the issue of reform to the urgent agenda of the international community of civilized nations. The Council’s inability to fulfill its most important mandate...
Challenges to Rule of Law & Democracy in Dominica Gabriel J. Christian, Esq. (o4 April 2022) — A forest – in all its splendor – is often best appreciated from a distance. From a distance all one sees is ofttimes a seamless green blanket, in undulating beauty. However, it is only amidst the forest – and close – that one appreciates the coiled vines; rough bark; and the towering tree trunks which support the lofty leaf-laden branches. So too with democracy, one can...
Caribbean Integration Promises not kept: CARICOM needs a Renaissance Ambassador Curtis Ward (Full text of Podcast) (26 March 2022) — The Treaty of Chaguaramas, signed, July 4, 1973, by four Caribbean visionary leaders, establishing the Caribbean Community and Common Market (CARICOM), setting out their vision, hope, and optimism to create regional integration, by creating an economic and cooperative arrangement after the demise of the West Indies Federation more than a decade earlier, was...
We are not at war, but we are not safe Ambassador Curtis A. Ward (10 March 2022) –– Speaking as a Jamaican, we are not at war with any country, and we don’t expect to be. We are at war with ourselves. This reality is lived my many Jamaicans in their daily experiences. The high levels of crime, particularly homicide, and the wanton use of guns, put every Jamaican at risk. Some, because of the neighborhoods they live in are most vulnerable and are at greatest risk. They do not have...
