UN chief names new envoy for Guyana-Venezuela border controversy

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday announced the appointment of Dag Halvor Nylander of Norway as his personal representative on the Border Controversy between Guyana and Venezuela.

"Mr. Nylander will actively engage with the governments of Guyana and Venezuela with a view to exploring and proposing options for a solution to the border controversy between the two countries," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here.

"If, by the end of 2017, the secretary-general concludes that no significant progress has been made, he will choose the International Court of Justice as the next means of settlement, unless the governments of Guyana and Venezuela jointly request that he refrain from doing so," Dujarric said.

Nylander was most recently the Norwegian special envoy to the Colombia peace process.

In September 2015, Venezuela and Guyana reached an agreement to restore their respective ambassadors and begin bilateral talks, under the mediation of the United Nations, over a long-standing territorial dispute.

The controversy centers on the lands west of the Essequibo River of Guyana, covering about two thirds of the small English-speaking nation after the U.S. company made an offshore oil discovery this year.

The dispute stems from an 1899 court ruling that required Venezuela to relinquish an undeveloped but resource-rich jungle territory called the Essequibo.

Caracas contends the ruling was invalid after a treaty was signed in 1966 with Guyana and its former colonial ruler, Britain.

The United Nations has mediated in the conflict and assigned a commission to try to find a solution but neither of the countries had agreed on the issue. Enditem