Law, Power, and the Caribbean: CARICOM’s Test of Unity in the Shadow of U.S. Military Action

By Ronald Sanders

Just four days after Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leaders jointly reaffirmed the region as a “Zone of Peace,” Trinidad & Tobago’s Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar delivered a jarring counterpoint. In a blunt public statement, she urged CARICOM to “get together” and share the burden of hosting undocumented Venezuelans – and to pressure Caracas into accepting 200 Venezuelan nationals currently imprisoned in Trinidad.

Should any fellow CARICOM state object to her stance, she declared with unmistakable defiance: “She did not care.”

The remark – equal parts frustration and provocation – cut through the carefully calibrated diplomacy of the October 18 CARICOM communiqué. That statement had sought to project regional unity in the face of escalating unilateral U.S. military operations targeting alleged narco-traffickers off the coasts of Venezuela and Colombia.

Instead, Persad-Bissessar’s comments laid bare a deeper tension: the fragile balance between collective sovereignty and national exigency in a region of small states perpetually buffeted by external pressures.

The Fragile Balance Between National Burden and Regional Solidarity

Trinidad & Tobago does, indeed, shoulder one of the heaviest per-capita burdens in CARICOM from Venezuelan migration and transnational organized crime. Its geographic proximity to Venezuela makes it a frontline state in both humanitarian and security terms.

Yet while the frustration is understandable, the tone and framing of the Prime Minister’s remarks risked transforming a shared regional challenge into a zero-sum contest of national interests.

This is more than semantics. When regional discourse shifts from coordination to confrontation, the very architecture of CARICOM begins to crack. The Caribbean’s strength has never derived from military might or economic scale, but from its disciplined adherence to international law and its capacity to speak with one voice on matters of collective concern.

Fragmentation – however justified by domestic politics – invites external powers to exploit divisions, turning partnership into proxy and sovereignty into illusion.

CARICOM’s foundational ethos rests on a simple but powerful premise: small states survive and thrive not by going it alone, but by acting together within the bounds of law. Cooperation with larger democracies – whether the United States, the European Union, or others – has served the region well, but only when such partnerships are anchored in transparency, mutual consent, and respect for multilateral frameworks, including the UN Charter and the Law of the Sea Convention.

Law as the Bedrock of Caribbean Security

The duty to readmit nationals lies unequivocally with the state of origin – in this case, Venezuela. Burden-sharing among CARICOM members is a political choice, not a legal obligation, and cannot be coerced through rhetorical ultimatums.

To conflate diplomatic pressure with legal duty is to replace the rule of law with the logic of leverage – a dangerous precedent for a region whose security depends on normative order, not raw power.

None of this diminishes the urgency of the challenges: uncontrolled migration, drug trafficking, and transnational crime are real and pressing. But security built outside the law is inherently unstable – and ultimately self-defeating.

As the October 18 CARICOM statement rightly cautioned, unilateral “security build-ups” in the region threaten not only peace but the very sovereignty CARICOM seeks to protect.

The Zone of Peace is not a passive slogan; it is an active framework. It does not prohibit the pursuit of criminals or cooperation with international partners.

Rather, it demands that such actions be conducted through agreed-upon, lawful channels – never as instruments of regime change or geopolitical coercion. Venezuela, too, must uphold its responsibilities: providing consular access, issuing travel documents, and facilitating the return of its nationals.

Regional solidarity requires reciprocity.

Unity Without Uniformity: The Path Forward for CARICOM

CARICOM has always accommodated diversity. Geography, trade ties, and development partnerships naturally lead some members to align more closely with certain external actors.

That is not betrayal – it is realism. But realism must not eclipse principle.

Collective sovereignty – the ability to act as one where it matters – depends on tolerating national differences without allowing them to fracture the whole.

As I have argued before, “Governments must understand why some among them, in their national interest, must be more accommodating of larger powers. But collective sovereignty cannot endure if it invites individual punishment.”

Trinidad & Tobago’s stance encapsulates this tension. The real test for CARICOM is whether it can absorb such pressures without unraveling.

The path forward is clear: regular, inclusive consultation; regionally endorsed positions that account for both shared principles and specific national circumstances; and an unwavering commitment to legality. CARICOM’s strength lies not in the assertion of isolated sovereignty, but in the discipline of collective action.

If Caribbean leaders allow security debates to devolve into litmus tests of loyalty – to Washington, Caracas, or any external capital – they will find that the Zone of Peace has been outsourced. And the rent, as history shows, is paid in lost sovereignty.

Accommodation may be necessary. Abdication is not. The Caribbean can – and must – cooperate with the world without surrendering its agency.

That is the only way the Zone of Peace becomes more than a declaration. It becomes a shield.

Ronald Sanders is Antigua & Barbuda’s Ambassador to the US and the OAS