The issue of reparations for native genocide and African slavery should remain a focal point of discussion between the region and Europe.

Prime Minister Dr Ralph Gonsalves made this point yesterday, after signing a Letter of Intent with a Hugh Walker, head of the Department for International {{more}}Development of the British Government at Cabinet Room.

The Prime Minister said that the Caribbean region is interested in having a conversation not only involving Britain, but involving other countries in Europe, to see how reparations for native genocide and African slavery fit in to a post 2015 development dialogue.

“Because we have already said that in relation to reparations, we don’t want to have any confrontation with the British government, we don’t want to have any confrontation with the French, in the case of Haiti, for example.

“And when we speak on this issue, though it is an issue with a high degree of emotion, we have to keep it nevertheless within the developmental context, where we are looking at the legacy of under-development in relation to all of those matters and others, which legacy we have been dealing with on an ongoing basis in our cooperation, but which we need to have a sharper focus.”

Gonsalves indicated that he had intended to digress from the purpose of the meeting, had Desmond Swain, Minister of State in the Ministry of Overseas Development attended.

Swain, who was supposed to sign the Letter of Intent, had to return to London for a parliamentary meeting.

“I had indicated to my brother Hugh that had the minister come, I would have made precisely the same point which I have just made, so that the people of St Vincent and the Grenadines and the Caribbean would know that is an issue which is not in this Letter of Intent, because that discussion has not taken place, but that’s the discussion we would want to see take place within the context of the global discussion on the post 2015 Millennium Development Goals.

Walker did not comment on the Prime Minister’s statement.(JJ)