And today in a Zoom press briefing, the Belize Defense Force told us that they were alarmed by the aggression that the GAF showed on the 18th. That's because it had been a while since there had been any confrontation between the two military organizations. And with the upcoming court case at the ICJ, Acting Chief of Staff, Lieutenant Colonel Jermaine Burns explained that they will be seeking answers for the reasons behind the incident.
Lt. Col. Jermaine Burns, Chief of Staff, B.D.F.
"I know that they eventually intercepted the 5 civilian boats and the 5 Guatemalan Arms Forces vessels and then that's when everything that Wil Maheia said happen happened. This issue is something bigger than my pay scale as you'd imagine. It is something that has to be discussed at the diplomatic level. I'm sure there is going to be some level of a protest note to send over to Guatemala in respect to this and again, tomorrow in a meeting with the Guatemalans I'll be mentioning this, because I'm heading a delegation over on that side - that we are concerned about that flare up on the 18th. And we'll see where the discussions go in respect to what they have to say about it. Because we haven't had a flare up like this in as much as 2-3 years, so it is a concern. Just like you I'm equally alarmed and I am eager to hear the answers from the practitioners tomorrow in Guatemala, the guys that are actually the bosses of those that are on the ground, because there will be representatives from the marine element at this meeting tomorrow."
"What is being said at the diplomatic level, I'm not sure. I haven't been privy to that, but I'm sure that the ministry of foreign affairs has been engaging their ministry of foreign affairs to get some answers. So you may want to be knocking at their doors to ask them diplomatically what is happening. But we are going to be knocking on the practitioners doors tomorrow to ask what's the issue there and why now and what provoked this and then we're going to have to be thinking strategically to see if we are to anticipate any much more flare ups as we get closer to the date of our court case."
