A disputed maritime claim by Venezuela in the eastern Caribbean is making neighboring island states apprehensive about Venezuela’s intentions.

Venezuela’s claims ownership of Aves or Bird Island which is located in the center of the Caribbean Seas 340 miles north of coast of Venezuela and approximately 70 miles west of Dominica, which is 430 miles southeast of Puerto Rico.

Since 2004 Venezuela has upgraded its outpost on Aves and dispatched a team of officials and military personnel to impress Dominica that it should surrender its claim to the tiny islet.

Aves consists of a mere 10 acres. It is only 375 meters long, never more than 50 meters wide and rises only four meters above the sea on a calm day. It is sometimes completely submerged during hurricanes. It is a resting place for seabirds and green sea turtles.

Venezuela’s moves are making states in the area nervous because they view them as motivated by the large fishing reserves (tuna, grouper and red snapper) there as well as the potential for oil exploration. Venezuela thinks Aves has great economic potential, not just for bird droppings used as fertilizer but for the endangered green turtles as well.

Dominica has complained to the United Nations that Venezuela’s claim to an extensive Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of up to 200 nautical miles (370 kilometers) from Aves is illegal.

“The 1992 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea prohibits isolated tiny islets from being used to make claims beyond the 12 nautical mile (22 kilometer) territorial sea limit,” said Charles Savarin, Dominica’s foreign minister. Venezuela is not a signatory of the Convention.

“No one can ignore Venezuela’s ownership of Aves,” said President Hugo Chavez in 2001. “It is Venezuela. We are constructing a much more solid base to give us a gigantic extension of territorial sea and an exclusive economic zone.”

Dominica is a member of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) and that regional group is also concerned by Venezuela’s move. “Venezuela clearly has a strategy for Aves Island and we intend to do something about it,” said Baldwin Spencer, prime minister of Antigua-Barbuda and current OECS chair, at the organization’s summit in early November.

The OECS comprises Antigua-Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, St. Kitts-Nevis, St. Lucia and St. Vincent & the Grenadines as well as Anguilla, the British Virgin Islands and Montserrat are not independent and Great Britain is responsible for their foreign relations.

Issue addressed by Caricom
The OECS in turn is also part of the 15-member Caribbean Community (Caricom) and that organization is also concerned about Venezuela’s moves. “The official position of Caricom is that any future discussions (regarding Aves) must be conducted in accordance with applicable principles of international law,” said Edwin Carrington, Caricom secretary general, referring to the UN Sea Convention.

“Caricom supports the maritime integrity of the affected member states including relevant maritime areas and calls on all member states to respect the rules and principles contained in the Convention,” said Carrington.

Since neither the OECS nor Caricom have the clout to counter Venezuela’s moves, the next level to address the situation could be at the Organization of American States (OAS) or at the UN.

Some regional observers see the OAS route as unlikely because of the growing influence of Venezuela under Chavez in that organization. That leaves the UN option with arbitration by the Sea Convention but observers point out that Venezuela is not a signatory of it.

Venezuela has defended ownership of Aves since 1865 and maintains its claim in undeniable, citing recognition of it by the U.S., France and the Netherlands. The establishment of an EEZ around Aves was first proclaimed by Venezuela in 1978. That same year Venezuela agreed to the demarcation of its maritime border with the U.S. by treaty with the U.S. in which Aves, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands (USVI) are referenced.

The University of Puerto Rico (UPR) at Mayaguez performed the first Global Positioning System (GPS) survey of Aves Island in 1997 as part of a wider geological survey that involved several islands in the Caribbean. Subsequewnt follow-ups to these efforts have not continued because of severe restrictions by the Venezuelan military authorities on entry into Aves by the UPR and other Caribbean researchers.

The situation may become further complicated by the important commercial relations between Puerto Rico and Venezuela and the current efforts by the administration of Gov. Anibal Acevedo Vila to tap the nearby petroleum resources of Venezuela as Puerto Rico is buffeted by high energy costs. At this time no connection has been established between the Aves controversy and the initiative of the current government of Puerto Rico.

Industry sources point to the high sulfur content of Venezuelan crude and the necessity for it to be processed to conform with U.S. environmental standards. A facility to process Venezuelan crude is the gigantic Hess Oil/Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. (Hovensa) refinery on St. Croix in the USVI, 100 miles southeast of Puerto Rico. Because of Hovensa, the USVI have emerged as Puerto Rico’s second largest trading partner in the Caribbean (After the Dominican Republic).

Venezuela has long had a close interest in the Caribbean and it is the only nation that maintains embassies and even cultural institutes on each independent island including Dominica which only has a population of 69,029. It is not always a comfortable relationship because of Venezuela’s size and its power as a supplier of both oil and natural gas which has increased under Chavez.

Last June Chavez announced PetroCaribe, an agreement under which Venezuela will supply petroleum to Caribbean states at concessionary rates providing for contributions to a development fund which can then be drawn upon by beneficiaries. Subsequently Venezuela sent a technical team to Dominica to explore establishing a transit facility there to supply it with petroleum under PetroCaribe.

Most Caricom states including those in the OECS, suffering under high energy costs, quickly embraced PetroCaribe. But two others, Barbados and Trinidad-Tobago, declined, indicating that the pact needs further study.

Situation in Dominica being watched closely by France
In 1980 Venezuela signed an agreement with France defining the maritime border between Dominica and Guadeloupe and Martinque. Dominica is sandwiched between the two overseas departments of France.

Citing the agreements between Venezuela and the U.S. and France, Griffin St. Hilaire, an academician in Dominica who has followed the controversy closely, believes that Venezuela “hope to use the argument that these agreements with two major powers have already agreed to their maritime borders with Venezuela and that Dominica should fall into line.” St. Hilaire warns against “such a compromise because it would leave Dominica with sovereignty over only 35 square miles of sea west of Dominica.”

The drama has the signs of a classic David and Goliath confrontation. Venezuela’s Chavez is riding a wave of popularity at home and elsewhere because of his country’s valuable petroleum resources which he uses as an instrument of foreign policy fueled by the growing revenues they produce.

Dominica, on the other hand, is a small country enduring severe economic shakeout because of the collapse of its banana industry and its inability to expand its tourism potential. Its last two prime ministers died prematurely in office, Its latest leader, Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit, while getting high marks in his efforts to move his country forward, is faced with difficult circumstances including this latest Aves crisis.

Other countries in the region are watching the drama unfold as well. The Barbados Advocate has addressed the Aves question several times and most recently observed editorially, “regardless of Venezuela’s professed interest in the economic welfare of Caribbean states, as expressed in the PetroCaribe deal, which the OECS eagerly embraced, its presumption of ownership of Aves is hardly the way to reinforce that interest.” Continuing the editorial states bluntly that “quite the contrary it tells small, militarily impotent states that respect goes no further than a powerful neighbor wants them to go. It is clear that South America’s most assertive left-leaning state wants to flex its muscles. But if it does not relish being damned as a bully, it should first agree to hear what OECS leaders have to say during a meeting they are seeking with Venezuela's president."