PM Pledges T&T Support for Earthquake-Ravaged Venezuela

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has pledged Trinidad and To­ba­go’s sup­port to earth­quake-rav­aged Venezuela, say­ing the Gov­ern­ment stands ready to pro­vide hu­man­i­tar­i­an as­sis­tance as the neigh­bour­ing coun­try grap­ples with wide­spread dev­as­ta­tion.

In a state­ment to­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar ex­pressed sym­pa­thy to the Venezue­lan peo­ple fol­low­ing Wednes­day night’s pow­er­ful earth­quakes, which have claimed lives and left ex­ten­sive de­struc­tion.

“The Gov­ern­ment and peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go, and I, ex­tend our heart­felt sym­pa­thy to the Gov­ern­ment and peo­ple of Venezuela fol­low­ing the re­cent earth­quake, which has caused loss of life and de­struc­tion,” the Prime Min­is­ter said.

“Our thoughts, prayers, and sol­i­dar­i­ty are with all those af­fect­ed. We stand ready to as­sist in what­ev­er hu­man­i­tar­i­an way we can dur­ing this dif­fi­cult time.”

She added, “We wish the peo­ple of Venezuela safe­ty, strength, and a swift re­cov­ery as they nav­i­gate the af­ter­math of this nat­ur­al dis­as­ter.”

The Gov­ern­ment’s of­fer of as­sis­tance comes as Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath con­firmed that Trinidad and To­ba­go has al­ready opened dis­cus­sions with Venezue­lan au­thor­i­ties and is await­ing an as­sess­ment of the coun­try’s most ur­gent hu­man­i­tar­i­an needs be­fore mo­bil­is­ing aid.

Padarath said For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers had ad­vised that dis­cus­sions were un­der­way with the Venezue­lan Gov­ern­ment fol­low­ing the twin earth­quakes, which struck with­in min­utes of each oth­er, mea­sur­ing mag­ni­tudes of 7.2 and 7.5.

The dis­as­ter prompt­ed Act­ing Pres­i­dent Del­cy Ro­dríguez to de­clare a na­tion­al state of emer­gency af­ter at least 164 peo­ple were killed, near­ly 1,000 in­jured and dozens of build­ings col­lapsed. Search and res­cue op­er­a­tions con­tin­ued yes­ter­day as emer­gency crews worked to lo­cate sur­vivors trapped be­neath the rub­ble.

Padarath said the Gov­ern­ment had al­ready con­veyed its con­do­lences to Venezuela.

“We of­fer our sin­cere con­do­lences to our broth­ers and sis­ters in Venezuela. Dur­ing this most try­ing and dif­fi­cult time, we stand ready in sol­i­dar­i­ty to pro­vide any as­sis­tance,” he said.

He ex­plained that Venezue­lan au­thor­i­ties are cur­rent­ly com­pil­ing an as­sess­ment of their im­me­di­ate hu­man­i­tar­i­an re­quire­ments be­fore seek­ing in­ter­na­tion­al sup­port.

“The Gov­ern­ment of Venezuela is prepar­ing a list of their im­me­di­ate needs that we can pos­si­bly sup­port. Once that list is pro­vid­ed to the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go, we will ac­tion based on what we are able to pro­vide and as­sist with,” Padarath said.

He added that the Gov­ern­ment is al­so en­gag­ing Cor­po­rate Trinidad and To­ba­go and oth­er stake­hold­ers to co­or­di­nate any re­lief ef­fort that may be re­quired.

“We con­tin­ue to work with oth­er en­ti­ties, whether it’s Cor­po­rate Trinidad and To­ba­go or the wider na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty in pro­vid­ing any sup­port that we can,” he said.

Padarath said fur­ther de­tails on Trinidad and To­ba­go’s con­tri­bu­tion would be an­nounced once Venezue­lan au­thor­i­ties com­plete their dam­age as­sess­ment and iden­ti­fy the coun­try’s pri­or­i­ty hu­man­i­tar­i­an needs.