Almost everyone agrees El Esequibo belongs to Guyana.
“The Venezuelan sun rises in Esequibo,” Maduro tweeted in 2021. “The Venezuelan people reiterate their firm and irreducible determination to defend our sovereignty.”
Guyana firmly rejects Venezuela’s centuries-old claim — and has been backed by nearly all the world’s governments. To Guyana, the border dispute, such as it ever was, was settled more than a century ago.
But, the maps. In the years since ExxonMobil discovered massive reserves of oil in the ocean floor off the territory in 2015 — a windfall that has turned tiny Guyana into one of the world’s fastest-growing economies — versions of the Esequibo-claiming charts, some of them produced by Maduro’s government, have proliferated on social media.
Maduro says Guyana is developing valuable resources in Venezuelan waters. Caracas is accused of harassing ships there.
At Guyana’s urging, the United Nations in 2018 referred the matter to the International Court of Justice for what Georgetown hopes will be the final word. With that case pending, Foreign Secretary Robert Persaud has asked Facebook and Twitter to take down maps that show Venezuela with a chunk of Guyana attached. The Foreign Ministry met virtually with Facebook officials in October about what it called the “campaign of disinformation.”
The maps, Persaud told the social media giant, could “permanently damage relations between States, incite violence against the territory and people of Guyana, and derail the current adjudication of the matter.” Neither Facebook nor Twitter responded to requests for comment.
“We are a very peace-loving nation,” Persaud told The Washington Post. “We always try to have very strong and fruitful ties with our neighbors, including Venezuela.”
“We’re asking the social media platform to respect what the United Nations and international law is on these matters and not to contribute in any way to damaging good neighborly relations.”
We are Guyana pic.twitter.com/FkZZxWpbPy
— Robert M Persaud (@PersaudRobert) October 6, 2022
A centuries-old dispute
The map flap is only the latest flare-up in a dispute that stretches back centuries. It drew in the United States and Britain, on opposing sides. Their 19th-century contretemps on the matter is considered the “last major dispute” between the allies.
Venezuela says its territory has extended east to the Essequibo River since the country declared independence from Spain in 1811. Guyana says its ownership began in 1814, when Britain gained control through a treaty with the Netherlands. That treaty, though, left the territory’s western boundary undefined.
Atlantic
Ocean
Caribbean
Sea
El Esequibo
Caracas
TRINIDAD &
TOBAGO
Guyanese territory
claimed by Venezuela
VENEZUELA
Georgetown
GUYANA
Bogotá
FRENCH
GUIANA
SURINAME
(FRA.)
COLOMBIA
Boa
Vista
Macapá
Equator
BRAZIL
Belém
Manaus
PERU
300 MILES
Caribbean Sea
Atlantic Ocean
El Esequibo
Guyanese territory
claimed by Venezuela
Caracas
FRENCH
GUIANA
VENEZUELA
Georgetown
(FRANCE)
GUYANA
SURINAME
COLOMBIA
Boa
Vista
Macapá
Equator
BRAZIL
Manaus
PERU
300 MILES
Caribbean Sea
Atlantic Ocean
El Esequibo
Guyanese
territory
claimed by
Venezuela
Caracas
VENEZUELA
Georgetown
GUYANA
Bogotá
COLOMBIA
Boa
Vista
FRENCH
GUIANA
SURINAME
Equator
(FRANCE)
BRAZIL
PERU
Manaus
300 MILES
Britain commissioned the explorer Robert Schomburgk to clarify the frontier, and he came through: His Schomburgk Line granted more territory than London had claimed. It was timely, too, because the region would soon be found to contain gold.
In 1841, Venezuela disputed the borders of what by then was British Guiana. Invoking the then-new Monroe Doctrine, Caracas pressed Washington for help.
That help came in 1895 when President Grover Cleveland asked Congress to authorize a border commission to determine the extent of Venezuelan territory, and declared that it would “be the duty of the United States to resist by every means in its power” any British appropriation of such land as a “willful aggression upon its rights and interests.”
That was taken as a threat. Some saw a third war with Britain looming.
The sides agreed to arbitration. The 1899 tribunal comprised five jurists — two named by Venezuela (American lawyers, one a U.S. chief justice), two by Britain (British lawyers), and a fifth chosen by those four (a Russian diplomat). They decided the bulk of the disputed territory was British Guiana’s.
And that appeared to be that, for the next 50 years. Then, in 1949, a letter emerged suggesting the Russian had colluded with the British. Venezuela disputed the validity of the 1899 decision.
Washington would see value in keeping the issue alive. In 1962, at the height of the Cold War, Secretary of State Dean Rusk, advising President John F. Kennedy on ways to prevent a communist takeover in British Guiana, suggested they could “encourage Venezuela and possibly Brazil to pursue their territorial claims.”
When Guyana gained independence from Britain in 1966, its new government agreed with Venezuela that a joint border commission would resolve the dispute. But the sides did not reach an understanding.
In Venezuela, support for recovering El Esequibo is nearly unanimous.
“Everyone agrees on this,” political consultant Pablo Quintero said. “Those in the government and those in the opposition studied with the same books. They received the same historical perspective. In that sense, there is only one reality.”
Washington no longer sides with Caracas. “The 1899 arbitral award determined the land boundary between Guyana and Venezuela and should be respected unless or until otherwise determined by a competent legal body,” Brian A. Nichols, the assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, tweeted in October.
Evan Ellis, a research professor of Latin American studies at the U.S. Army War College, said there’s only a “slim basis for Venezuela to keep this alive,” but it has become an article of faith “that the Esequibo was taken from them … that Venezuelans were historically wronged and [that] the law is only the law because of this injustice of the great powers collaborating against us.”
For Venezuelans, he said, the question is: “Is our government doing enough to defend our interests here?”
“Venezuela never gave up. But they started caring more when it turned out that there is at least 11 billion barrels of recoverable oil in that area,” he said.
Oil discovery
Just as the discovery of gold awakened the dispute in the 1880s, so has a run of more than 30 oil discoveries totaling an estimated 11 billion barrels since 2015. That boon, managed well, could transform Guyana, now a middle-income nation of 800,000 people.
“It’s hard to overestimate how much that oil means to the future of Guyana,” Ellis said. It provides “what was once one of the poorest countries in the entire hemisphere, on a per capita basis, with the potential, if it’s not completely squandered … to possibly becoming one of the richest countries in the hemisphere.”
Petroleum made up 62 percent of Guyana’s gross domestic product in 2022, up from 2 percent in 2019. The World Bank estimated that the country’s real GDP grew 57.8 percent last year. The country projected state oil revenue to climb further, hitting $1.63 billion this year.
TRINIDAD
AND
TOBAGO
Since 2015, ExxonMobil and its partners have drilled 13 productive wells in the southern part of the “Stabroek” exploration block.
Punta Playa
Ciudad
Guayana
Oil discoveries
Mabaruna
Atlantic
Ocean
VENEZUELA
Georgetown
El Esequibo
New Amsterdam
Guyanese territory
claimed by
Venezuela
Linden
Paramaribo
GUYANA
FRENCH
GUIANA
SURINAME
(FRANCE)
Kumaka
Essequibo
River
Boa Vista
BRAZIL
100 MILES
Since 2015, ExxonMobil and its partners have drilled
13 productive wells in the southern part of the
“Stabroek” exploration block.
Atlantic
Ocean
TRINIDAD
AND
TOBAGO
Stabroek
Punta
Playa
Oil discoveries
Ciudad
Guayana
VENEZUELA
Georgetown
New Amsterdam
El Esequibo
Guyanese territory
claimed by
Venezuela
Linden
Paramaribo
GUYANA
SURINAME
Essequibo
River
Boa Vista
100 MILES
BRAZIL
Since 2015, ExxonMobil and its partners
have drilled wells in the southern part of
the “Stabroek” exploration block.
Atlantic
Ocean
TRINIDAD
AND
TOBAGO
Stabroek
Punta
Playa
Orinoco R.
Oil discoveries
VENEZUELA
Georgetown
El Esequibo
Linden
Guyanese territory
claimed by
Venezuela
GUYANA
SURINAME
Essequibo
River
Boa Vista
BRAZIL
100 MILES
It was around oil exploration that Venezuela began harassing ships, allegedly detaining two fishing vessels in 2012; evicting a U.S.-operated oil exploration ship in 2013; and intercepting an ExxonMobil oil exploration ship in 2018.
Meghan Macdonald, a spokeswoman for ExxonMobil, said the corporation is licensed and operates in the region according to national and international laws.
What now?
Venezuela argued before the International Court of Justice in November that Guyana’s case should be dismissed. A decision is expected this year.
Maduro says Venezuela is adhering to the 1966 Geneva Agreement, which committed the countries “to reach a practical and mutually satisfactory settlement through friendly negotiations.” The existence of that agreement, Caracas argues, indicates that the 1899 tribunal was not final.
“We are now in the second chapter of the previous phase of the judicial process,” said Kenneth Ramírez, president of the Venezuelan Council on Foreign Relations. He said oil ships operate in “territory that is yet to be delimited.”
Persaud, Guyana’s foreign secretary, said that “there is no requirement in the agreement that we have that prohibits Guyana to use the resources over our territory. … Every single country other than Venezuela has recognized that this is the territory of Guyana.”
Some warn that scuttling the 1899 settlement would set a destabilizing precedent. “Guys, every 19th-century colonial border was dodgy!” the Venezuelan political commentator Francisco Toro wrote in 2015. “Ours was, if anything, more kosher than most. At least we had a formal process, and a big power fighting in our corner.”
Ellis says changes in Latin American politics could increase the vigor with which Venezuela asserts its claim. A recent leftward shift means Venezuela has “new ideological friends” heading nations nearby.
“It’s all too easy to see how the new politics could completely flip what was a pretty settled question up until this past year,” he said.
correction
A previous version of this article incorrectly stated the size of the oil discovery off Guyana as 11 million barrels. It’s estimated at 11 billion barrels. The article has been corrected.