In a formal address to the country’s parliament on Tuesday, St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ (SVG) Minister of Foreign Affairs Dwight Fitzgerald Bramble issued a clear, public clarification that the Caribbean nation has not entered into any binding agreement with the United States centered on third-country national relocation arrangements, confirming that negotiations over the proposed deal have slowed to a near standstill in recent weeks.
Brambles’ comments came in direct response to a question posed by opposition senator Carlos James, who asked the ruling administration to confirm whether the U.S. had submitted a formal request for a third-country agreement — a deal that would allow for the transfer of non-U.S. nationals from American territory to SVG for processing and relocation — and whether Kingstown had finalized and signed any such arrangement.
Bramble laid out the full timeline of the outreach to parliament, explaining that the U.S. government first approached SVG with a formal request to explore a partnership focused on third-country national issues, and followed the initial request by sharing a draft draft memorandum of understanding (MoU) for SVG’s leadership to review. He emphasized that this U.S. initiative is not targeted exclusively at SVG, but is part of a broader regional outreach effort that includes all member states of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS).
In line with the regional scope of the proposal, Bramble noted that SVG has coordinated closely with its OECS neighbors to review the draft text collectively, approaching the potential arrangement through a collaborative regional framework rather than engaging in independent negotiations. Despite months of preliminary discussions and review of the draft document, Bramble stressed that talks have never advanced to the stage of a binding commitment.
When updating lawmakers on the current state of negotiations, Bramble confirmed that the process has decelerated sharply over the past few weeks, with little to no forward movement on finalizing any terms. He repeated multiple times during his address that no agreement has been signed, nor has any finalized binding deal ever been presented to SVG’s government for approval.
Brambles did not provide additional specific details on the contents of the draft MoU, including what specific groups of migrants would have been covered by any finalized arrangement. The question from the opposition senator comes amid growing regional and global debate over third-country national processing and relocation schemes, which have become a controversial topic of migration policy discussions across the Americas in recent years. Bramble’s address made a clear distinction between receiving and reviewing a proposal, and formally agreeing to enter into a binding deal, leaving no ambiguity about SVG’s current position on the proposed U.S. partnership.