Saturday 27 May 2006
Ships offshore during exercise
Flanked by a fast motorboat of the navy, the submarine Zeeleeuw leaves the Anna Bay.
CURACAO – The start of the Joint Caribbean Lion yesterday, symbolized by the station ship Van Nes, the Belgian Westdiep, the aircraft carrier USS Bataan, transport ship FS Francis Garnier, the submarine Zeeleeuw and the commando frigate De Ruyter leaving the harbour one after the other. Only the supply ship Zuiderkruis remained in port due to technical problems, which were fixed today.
For the next days, the ships will stay offshore close to the island. The first exercise was a humanitarian disaster that took place ashore in Fuikbaai. This exercise will be repeated this coming Friday for the team of the Belgian ship.
Meanwhile, the 8th participating navy vessel has also arrived, namely the USS Taylor that jointed the others offshore and for the time being, will not put into port. The USS Fort McHenry and the Canadian ships Montreal and Preserver are expected to arrive later. Expectations are that eventually a total of 12 naval vessels will take part.
Joint Caribbean Lion (JCL) requires a lot of flexibility of the planners, also due to the late arrival of the transport ship Rotterdam that is still in Surinam. Even though it is an exercise, the scenarios must have surprising elements. The program is therefore surrounded with secrecy. Main purpose of the exercise is the testing of the new joint set-up in which all the Dutch branches of military service in cooperation with units of other countries perform operation on land, in which the set-up and assistance takes place on sea, the so-called sea basing. The benefit of this is that anywhere in the world unauthorized operations can take place, as long as it is outside the 12-miles zone of the territorial waters.
In the past few days, the Royal Military Police was very busy with escorting the several transports of riding material from Nieuwe Haven to the Suffisant base and the several operation areas, like Fuikbaai, Wacao, Hato and Eastpoint. Eastpoint owner Willy Maal has authorized the military to perform exercises on his property. The tanks are transported on flatbed trailers over the road. For the first time since long ago, the traffic in Curacao is coping with the phenomenon military column that always has the right-a-way.
The 6 F-16’s arrived on Military Hato today. They will be put in for air defence tasks as well as for assistance of land forces. The F-16’s will start flying this coming Friday. A max of 4 will fly at the same time.
The Dutch media reports in abundance on the Joint Caribbean Lion. The reports concentrate mostly on the fact that the exercise takes place on the doorstep of neighboring country Venezuela, and they also put emphasis on the relationship between the government leaders Hugo Chávez and George Bush.
Chinese interest in oil-prospecting near Aruba
Prime Minister Nelson Oduber (r) explaining what Aruba has to offer to Chinese investors.
ARUBA – A Chinese oil-refinery has shown interest in exploring and exploiting of oil and gas in the territorial waters around Aruba. Prime Minister Nelson Oduber (MEP) learned this during his visit to China.
On this trip, Oduber was accompanied by amongst others director of the Foreign Relations Administration (DBB) Agustin Vrolijk, director of the Free Zone Greg Peterson, and interim-director Aruban Investment Bank Frendsel Giel. Together with a representative of China Brazil Development Office, the Aruban delegation visited the PetroChina Fuel Oil Company that showed interest in exploring and exploiting of oil and gas in the territorial waters around Aruba. At the end of the visit, a representative of the Chinese refinery made it clear that the company would like to talk to Aruban business- and investments experts.
Karel van Oosterom, interim ambassador for the Royal Dutch Kingdom gave a reception in honour of the Aruban delegation, during which Oduber gave a presentation on “what the smallest island in the western hemisphere has to offer to the biggest country in the eastern hemisphere’ to representatives of the Chinese government, Chinese investors, representatives of countries in the region, and the media in Beijing. The presentation was in English and an interpreter translated his words for the Chinese listeners.
He talked about the possibilities that Aruba has to offer to investors and products from China that Aruba can import to the Latin American region, the Caribbean, and North America via gateway.
There was also another reception in honour of the Aruban delegation given by the KangMei Group, during which Oduber received a poster with more than 100 good wishes.