UNITED NATIONS, New York — Venezuela’s Acting President Delcy Eloína Rodríguez Gómez addressed the UN General Assembly’s 81st session Tuesday night, reasserting Caracas’s territorial claim over Guyana’s Essequibo region, days ahead of President Irfaan Ali’s own address to the Assembly, scheduled for Thursday.
Rodríguez arrived at the podium making a visual statement of her own: a cream suit paired with a brooch shaped like Venezuela’s map, including the Essequibo region.
“I would be remiss if I did not mention here, as the very headquarters of international law, our desire to reaffirm the historic rights of Venezuela,” Rodríguez told the Assembly, appealing to “the Cooperative Republic of Guyana to resolve the issue and to return to negotiations as stipulated by the Geneva Agreement.”
She argued that bilateral talks offer the more durable path: “Agreements which last the longest are those that emerge from bilateral negotiations; they last longer and function better than those imposed by external bodies.”
The remarks come as the dispute nears resolution. According to Guyana’s government, the case, brought to the International Court of Justice in 2018 under the 1966 Geneva Agreement, is now fully before the court following the conclusion of oral hearings on May 11, 2026, in The Hague. The government has said that with hearings closed, “all that remains now is for the Court itself to deliberate, draft its final Judgment, and issue it in a public session,” with a ruling possible as early as November 2026.
Rodríguez also addressed broader international scrutiny of her government. “For those that are asking which side Venezuela stands on, there you have our stances and our guiding principles,” she said. “We are on one side; that is the side of citizens of the world that are pursuing their happiness, their development, and their freedom.”
All eyes now turn to Thursday, when Ali is expected to respond from the same podium.