By AVA TURNQUEST

Tribune Chief Reporter

aturnquest@tribunemedia.net

FOREIGN Affairs Minister Darren Henfield yesterday flagged a robust agenda strengthening regional integration as Caribbean foreign ministers and other stakeholders began a two-day forum in the capital.

Mr Henfield said the Council for Foreign and Community Relations (COFCOR), a CARICOM body, will work to dissect outcomes of the recent Summit of Americas in Peru, and Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings in England.

He also forecast talks on the region’s shared struggle of being “named and shamed” as uncooperative tax jurisdictions by the European Union and OECD, with member countries of both entities participating in the forum.

He added that troubling issues associated with de-risking and correspondent banking were also on the agenda.

“We meet at a time when the urgency of our call to solidarity as a Caribbean Community, some near 45 years ago, could not be more critical,” Mr Henfield said.

“Our... objectives, ‘to encourage economic integration and cooperation; to even-handedly share therefrom; and to coordinate foreign policy’ in the interest of the collective, are as urgent today as they were at Chaguaramas in 1973.

“Even though, we will not always agree, it is incumbent upon us as foreign ministers and ambassadors – who invariably set the tone and tenor of the foreign policies of our respective nations and our region – to remain cognisant of our unspoken commitment to be our brothers’ keepers.”

Member states will also strategise negotiations for a successor to the Cotonou Agreement – between the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States and the European Union – set to expire in 2020.

Mr Henfield also noted the fast approaching hurricane season and the number of member states still in recovery mode in opening remarks at the British Colonial Hilton yesterday.

“With just 24 days before we enter the next hurricane season,” he said, “which experts suggest will be more active than the last one, and with Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, the Bahamas, Turks & Caicos, and others in the Region, all yet in recovery mode – any such dialogue must include the peculiar vulnerabilities of SIDS relative to sustainability, resilience, and access to development financing at concessionary rates, and which consider vulnerability over GDP and GNP.”