The 50th Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) is taking place in Basseterre, St. Kitts and Nevis. Marco Rubio, U.S. Secretary of State, is scheduled to attend the summit, which will run from February 24 to 27, 2026. St. Martin cultural and media organizations Culture Time and House of Nehesi Publishers (HNP) have sent an Open Letter to the CARICOM Secretariat and Heads of Government.
Representing their respective organizations, Fabian A. Badejo and Lasana M. Sekou write, “History will not remember the hospitality you show in St. Kitts; it will remember whether you stood with the people of Havana and Caracas, with the people of the wider Caribbean or with the hands” that are waging “‘economic warfare’ strangling Cuba and the ‘gunboat diplomacy’ reclaiming Venezuelan oil.” See the full letter below.
OPEN LETTER TO THE CARICOM SECRETARIAT AND HEADS OF GOVERNMENT
February 24, 2026
Dr. Carla Barnett
Secretary General of CARICOM
Subject: The 50th CARICOM Summit—A Firefighter’s Gathering or an Arsonist’s Audience?
Honourable Secretary-General,
Honourable Heads of Government,
As you gather in Basseterre, St. Kitts for the historic 50th Regular Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government, the eyes of the Caribbean people are not on the celebratory optics, but on the smoke rising from our neighbors’ houses that have been set on fire.
We find ourselves in a moment of existential irony: while the region’s elders condemn the “economic warfare” strangling Cuba and the “gunboat diplomacy” reclaiming Venezuelan oil, our current leaders have chosen to invite the chief architect of these very policies to the table. The US Secretary of State is not in St. Kitts to join your fire brigade; he is the one who struck the match in the first place.
For decades, the Caribbean has prided itself on being a “Zone of Peace.” Yet today, we watch as our waters are militarized and our sovereignty is bartered for visa access. To welcome the U.S. Secretary of State to this summit without a collective, forceful demand for the cessation of the illegal fuel blockade on Cuba is more than a diplomatic failure—it is an act of historical amnesia.
We, therefore, call on the Conference of Heads of Government to:
1. Acknowledge the Arson: Formally recognize that the January 29 Executive Order by the President of the United States targeting oil supplies to Cuba constitutes a violation of international law and a direct assault on regional stability.
2. Reject the “Chief’s Mark”: Discontinue the signing of bilateral “Deportee MOUs” that use the threat of visa bans to force Caribbean states to act as an auxiliary arm of U.S. border enforcement.
3. Use the Legal Shield: Leverage the February 20, 2026 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump. If the U.S.’s own courts have ruled these tariffs unconstitutional, why is CARICOM still acting as if they are a legitimate law of the land?
4. Demand a Reckoning, Not a “Reset”: A “reset” of relations is meaningless if the power dynamic remains that of a bully and the bullied. We do not need a partner who views our islands as a “backyard” to be policed; we need a neighbor who respects our sovereign right to exist.
History will not remember the hospitality you show in St. Kitts; it will remember whether you stood with the people of Havana and Caracas, with the people of the wider Caribbean or with the hands that turned off their lights. Empires may indeed be created by conquest, but they are sustained by the silence of the conquered.
At this 50th Summit, it is time to stop playing the audience to the arsonist and start defending the Caribbean homeland.
Respectfully,
Fabian A. Badejo Lasana M. Sekou
Host, Producer, Culture Time Projects Director
Radio Program, PJD-2 Radio House of Nehesi Publishers
St. Martin St. Martin
[Photos above: Left: Fabian A. Badejo, host, founder, Culture Time, St. Martin; right: Lasana M. Sekou, poet, author, HNP, St. Martin]