Musa: border incident is isolated
News 5 also spoke with Prime Minister Said Musa this afternoon regarding this latest border incident. The P.M. says he hopes this isolated incident is treated as such and does not affect the bilateral relationship between Belize and Guatemala.
Prime Minister Said Musa
“There has been an ongoing problem in the area, a land dispute between a Belizean Mr. Rojelio Lobos and a Guatemalan, now diseased, Jesus Ramirez. Mr. Ramirez has been in the reports to the Ministry of National Security for many months now. He has clearly causing a lot of problems in the area and he has been the one causing problems for Mr. Lobos. This incident came about because the BDF/Police got this report of a further incident and they went there really to try and pacify.”
Janelle Chanona
“When you say incidents, they were harassing Mr. Lobos?”
Prime Minister Said Musa
” Yes, and threatening the life of Mr. Lobos, claiming that Mr. Lobos is on his land, a land dispute. And this man, although a Guatemalan living on the Belize side, has refused to accept that he is in Belize and in fact, making it known that he has protection and nobody can’t tell him anything. It’s been a very difficult situation. And we have tried, we’ve brought to the attention of the Guatemalan authorities on several occasions, with a view for us to work together to try and settle this isolated incident, but which could have blossomed into something far more serious. Unfortunately, it has now. And we are still maintaining our position with the government of Guatemala, that we need to work together on this thing have this joint investigation with the presence of the human rights organisations and what have you.
It was with a view to pre-empt any unnecessary fallout from this incident, which clearly really should have nothing to do with the bilateral relations between Belize and Guatemala. Because this was strictly an incident that took place when the BDF/Police patrol were attacked by Guatemalan campesinos and they responded fearing for their lives.
We are hoping that the Guatemalan authorities will understand that this should not affect the ongoing dialogue that we have, that it should not affect the movement we have been making over the last several months, towards resolving our problem. But at this time, it’s a little bit too early to say what the final outcome will be resulting from this incident.
The matter seems to be raising a lot of media hysteria in Guatemala. Not surprisingly, because this is the way they’ve acted before, and of course, there’s been a lot of distortion in the Guatemalan press as to what happened. For instance, I gather they are making out that the incident took place in a village called Santa Cruz, which is on the Guatemalan side, when we can clearly verify, according to the reports I have received, that it took place will inside Belizean territory near San Vicente Village.”
