WILLEMSTAD--Curaçao’s Parliament has adopted a motion calling for a formal Kingdom-wide procedure requiring consultation with the Caribbean countries before international positions are taken on matters that directly affect them, a proposal that could give St. Maarten a more clearly defined role in determining future Kingdom positions at the United Nations and other international forums.
The move follows controversy over the Kingdom of the Netherlands’ decision to abstain from a March 25 United Nations vote on a resolution concerning the transatlantic trafficking and enslavement of Africans. Curaçao’s Parliament says its government was not consulted beforehand despite the historical and societal importance of slavery and its consequences to the Caribbean countries.
The Curaçao motion instructs its government to seek agreements with the Netherlands, Aruba and St. Maarten establishing a permanent procedure for international decision-making within the Kingdom. The proposal would spell out when the Caribbean countries must be consulted and how a common Kingdom position should be determined.
Curaçao wants the arrangement pursued under Article 38 of the Charter for the Kingdom of the Netherlands, which allows the Netherlands, Aruba, Curaçao and St. Maarten to enter into mutual arrangements. Such an agreement would require cooperation among the participating countries and is not created automatically by Curaçao Parliament’s motion alone.
The development is directly relevant to St. Maarten because its Parliament has already joined Curaçao and Aruba in challenging the Kingdom’s handling of the same UN vote.
On June 4, the parliamentary delegations of St. Maarten, Aruba and Curaçao adopted a joint resolution expressing disagreement with the Kingdom’s abstention and criticizing the failure to consult the three Caribbean countries before the position was taken.
The three delegations said the subject has direct historical, social and moral significance for their countries and described the lack of consultation as another example of what they called a structural “democratic deficit” within the Kingdom, particularly in foreign affairs.
The resolution was formally presented during the Interparliamentary Kingdom Consultation, IPKO, in The Hague by the presidents of the three Caribbean parliaments, including St. Maarten Parliament President Sarah Wescot-Williams. The Dutch parliamentary delegation was asked to bring the matter to the Kingdom government and seek a written, reasoned response.
Foreign relations are a Kingdom affair under the Charter, meaning international positions are generally taken on behalf of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The Kingdom Council of Ministers includes the Ministers Plenipotentiary of Aruba, Curaçao and St. Maarten when Kingdom matters affecting the countries are considered.
The dispute, however, has centered on how that involvement works in practice when an international matter has particular significance for the Caribbean countries.
Curaçao’s latest motion seeks to move beyond informal expectations by establishing a defined procedure for consultation before a Kingdom position is finalized.
The March UN resolution was adopted by 123 countries, while three voted against and 52 abstained, including the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The resolution described the trafficking of enslaved Africans and racialized chattel enslavement of Africans as the gravest crime against humanity and called for measures associated with reparatory justice.
The Dutch government has said it recognizes the immense injustice of slavery and its continuing consequences but objected to specific elements of the resolution, including what it viewed as establishing a hierarchy among crimes against humanity, applying international law retroactively and creating potential legal implications. Those concerns led to the decision to abstain.
For the Caribbean parliaments, the dispute has also become a question of representation within the Kingdom.
Curaçao’s Parliament argues that being represented internationally by the Kingdom should not mean that the Netherlands determines positions without meaningful prior involvement from Curaçao, Aruba or St. Maarten when their specific interests are at stake.
The Curaçao Parliament also wants its government to communicate Curaçao’s own position on the slavery resolution directly to the United Nations.
For St. Maarten, the significance of the motion is therefore broader than the slavery resolution itself. If Curaçao succeeds in securing an Article 38 arrangement involving all four countries, it could establish clearer rules governing when St. Maarten must be consulted and how its position is incorporated before the Kingdom speaks internationally on issues that directly affect the country.
