Guatemalan Military Patrol Also Within Belize’s Territorial Waters

Wil Maheia

According to Maheia, despite reporting the incident to local authorities, very little is being done to increase police and military presence in the area of the Sarstoon River.  In fact, Maheia says that they have been discouraged from patrolling the area.

Isani Cayetano

“Has this incident been reported or is this the first such occurrence that you guys have observed?”

Via Phone: Wil Maheia, Belize Territorial Volunteers

“No.  Well, you know, we always let the public know what we do and when we have incidents like this we make it known that it has happened and we show the photographs, photographs don’t lie.  But when we report this to the authorities it falls on deaf ears.  In fact, they discourage us.  Our own authorities would say, “Well what are you doing in that area?”  I mean we’ve heard the foreign minister discourage us from going to the border the first time.  So it’s useless and a waste of time to report these incidents to the government because they do nothing about it and, you know, the Guatemalans continue to exploit Belize’s waters because the area is filled with Guatemalan fishing vessels setting gill nets at the mouth of the river.  So, I mean, we are not serious, the government is not serious about curbing these kinds of illegal activities.”

News Five attempted to get a comment from Retired Colonel George Lovell, C.E.O. in the Ministry of National Security, earlier today but up to news time, we haven’t heard from him.