By Peter Richards
PM Gaston Browne
ST. JOHN’S, Antigua, CMC – Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leaders began their 35th annual summit here on Tuesday night with a reminder that the individual members countries of the regional integration grouping are too small and too vulnerable to sustain themselves in a changing global environment.
Newly elected Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne, the incoming chairman of the 15-member grouping, told the ceremony that unity was required to deal with an international community in which the rich and powerful achieve national advantage “even at the expense of the poor and weak.
“The prospects for our salvation lies today in that same practical principle that inspired it 49 years ago when three leaders set afloat the idea of integration into the Caribbean Sea that has washed up mightily on all our shores to create our Caribbean Community of today,” Browne told the audience.
