by TONY BEST

CHARLIE SKEETE, a former Barbados Ambassador in Washington, has taken issue with the term "ethnic cleansing" by Sir Shridath Ramphal, a former Commonwealth secretary, in reference to Barbados' new immigration policy.

"Coming from somebody like [Sir] Shridath Ramphal, who has had a prominent Caribbean position, I would have thought that there would have been a lot more care and thought before a statement like that would cross his lips," said Skeete. "He knows better."

Skeete, a member of a distinguished CARICOM panel of experts in the early 1980s that looked at the future of the regional integration movement, called on the former chancellor of the University of the West Indies not only to withdraw his statement on ethnic cleansing because it was untrue, but to apologise to the people of Barbados for making it in the first place.

"Withdraw it with an apology . . . . But a statement like that should not be allowed to stand. We have no history of racial tension" in Barbados.

That was why the economist was so "disappointed" when he heard about the remark.

"I am disappointed that a person who for years has professed to be a Caribbean patriot would make a statement like that, that is so contrary to fact, so mischievous in its intent and its import," Skeete added. "I am deeply, deeply disappointed."

Definition

The Oxford Dictionary defines ethnic cleansing as "the mass expulsion or killing of one ethnic or religious group in an area by those of another." The United Nations defines it as "rendering an area ethnically homogeneous by using force or intimidation to remove from a given area persons of another ethnic or religious group."

Skeete was the second formerly prominent Barbadian who represented the country as its top diplomat in the United Stated capital to call on Sir Shridath to withdraw the statement.

Sir Courtney Blackman, the first Governor of the Central Bank who went on to become Ambassador to the United States and the Organisation of American States in the 1990s, said recently that Sir Shridath's statement was untrue and implied that ethnically inspired violence was part of the country's new immigration policy.

"I think Sir Shridath should consider withdrawing his words," he said.

Skeete has firmly backed the Thompson administration's new immigration policy on the grounds that it was about time that Barbados brought the illegal immigration situation under control.

"We are a small, densely populated country where there is clear evidence of a large number of undocumented, to use the United States term, as well as documented immigrants in Barbados. And we are going to let the rest of the Caribbean, especially the big countries, come and lecture us?

'Laid-back' attitude

"Guyana could swallow up Barbados in one of its small rivers and we are going to let these people lecture us on immigration? The Government [of Barbados] would be irresponsible - I say so openly, irresponsible - if it did not try to get a handle on this problem," he said.

Skeete insisted that Barbados has one of the most "laid-back" attitudes in the region on racial matters. Ethnic antagonism wasn't part of Barbados' more recent history, he said. Hence, his criticism of Sir Shridath for the use of a term that's commonly associated with racial animosity and violence.

Just as important, he argued that Barbados' policy shouldn't be "dictated" by its neighbours, especially countries with a larger land mass than the island nation.

"They are in no position to lecture us," Skeete said. "They have benefited from what I would consider to be rather lax immigration policies in Barbados for a number of years. The time has come to get a handle on the problem. Barbadians have to decide that."

In addition to Skeete, the other members of the 1980s CARICOM panel of experts included Nobel laureate Sir Arthur Lewis, Sir Shridath, Alistair McIntyre and William Demas.