OECS Heads to meet in St. Lucia

Tuesday, January 20, 2004

CASTRIES, St. Lucia: OECS Heads of Government will meet in St. Lucia on Thursday January 22nd and Friday 23rd. They will be attending the 38th meeting of the OECS Authority, which was postponed from November last year.

The meeting is expected to agree on measures to further advance the movement towards an OECS economic union, including common OECS Citizenship, and the common OECS passport.

The Heads are also due to examine the level of implementation of the OECS Development strategy that will guide the future economic development of the sub-region.

Several critical issues involved in current international trade negotiations, such as the proposed hemispheric Free Trade Area of the Americas, are also down for discussion.

The Heads were also expected to give their approval for a number of cooperation initiatives that offer wide-ranging benefits to the people of the sub-region. These include stronger OECS/Puerto and OECS Guadeloupe relations.

The meeting was postponed from November because three Heads of Government were ill and the Prime Minister of Grenada would have been absent due to his country's pending November 27th general elections.

Decisions at meetings of the OECS Authority are arrived at by consensus, and the Heads therefore felt that the very important matters on the agenda for the meeting required the full presence and input of all Heads.

The OECS is a grouping of the nine Member States of Antigua/Barbuda, Anguilla, the British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, St. Kitts/Nevis, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines.  

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