By Sir Ronald Sanders
Few issues test the sovereignty of small states more severely than requests made by powerful friends. How should a country respond when cooperation is expected, but the proposed terms exceed its legal, financial and institutional capacity? That question lies at the centre of the discussions between the United States and several Caribbean governments over Third-Country Nationals (TCNs).
These are persons whom the United States wishes to remove but who are not nationals of the country to which they are being sent. Instead, they are transferred to a third, unrelated country under arrangements negotiated for the purposes of US immigration enforcement.
The terms the United States has been seeking are worth understanding clearly. The original US proposals envisaged a standing, programmatic arrangement under which transfers would occur on a monthly basis. Critical information about individuals was to be provided only “where available.” Financial responsibility for the costs of reception, accommodation, healthcare, and eventual return was left unresolved. And persons subject to expedited removal, meaning they may never have had a proper hearing, were included among those eligible for transfer.
These proposals generated understandable concern among Caribbean governments and their peoples. A small island state that accepts persons in these circumstances assumes potentially significant legal responsibilities under international refugee law, obligations relating to stateless persons, and the principle of non-refoulement, which prohibits returning individuals to places where they face persecution or other serious harm. Yet many Caribbean countries simply do not possess the legal infrastructure, administrative systems or financial capacity that larger states can more readily deploy.
Antigua and Barbuda is, in fact, already home to a substantial migrant population. Significant numbers of nationals from the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Cuba, Jamaica, Guyana, Dominica, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and elsewhere reside in the country. It is against that reality, not any absence of goodwill, that capacity must be measured. Antigua and Barbuda has always been willing, and remains genuinely open, to reaching an agreement with the United States on Third-Country Nationals. But any such arrangement must be grounded in the practical realities of what a small island state can responsibly absorb, physically and financially, without imposing hardship on its own people.
Against this backdrop, Antigua and Barbuda stands apart from its Caribbean counterparts in one important respect. It is the first Caribbean government and, to my knowledge, remains the only one to have fully disclosed the substance of the US proposals, published its own detailed counter-proposals, and issued a comprehensive White Paper for public consideration. That White Paper, posted on government websites and made available to every citizen, explains the background, the legal concerns, the operating procedures proposed by the United States, and the principles on which Antigua and Barbuda’s own counter-proposals were constructed.
Any opportunity for the region to engage through a common framework has largely passed, because several member states entered bilateral discussions before any collective position could be developed. The absence of comparable public disclosure also made any meaningful prospect of a coordinated CARICOM approach increasingly difficult. In any event, and this should be acknowledged honestly, a single CARICOM agreement would not have been practical even if the United States had been willing. Caribbean countries differ enormously in size, financial capacity, absorptive capability, constitutional arrangements and the nature of their bilateral relationships with Washington. Each country must make decisions appropriate to its own circumstances. A one-size-fits-all approach to an issue of this sensitivity was never a realistic option.
The government of Antigua and Barbuda had a clear purpose in publishing its White Paper: to inform its parliament and people fully and honestly about what was being proposed and how the government intended to respond. Democracy demands that matters touching sovereignty, national security and public finance should be debated openly, not resolved quietly behind closed doors.
The subsequent parliamentary debate, culminating in the adoption of a Resolution by the House of Representatives on 15 July 2026, reflected the same principles. Parliament did not simply endorse the government’s approach. It established the framework within which negotiations may continue: no standing programme; complete sovereign discretion in every individual case; full prior funding; strict eligibility criteria; and the preserved right to suspend or terminate any arrangement at any time.
This episode, however, is about more than Third-Country Nationals. It illustrates a much older and more enduring reality that small states have always had to navigate. Throughout history, and no less today, powerful countries, regional groupings and the institutions they influence have exercised disproportionate authority in shaping international rules to which smaller states are expected to conform. The OECD and related bodies, for example, have imposed standards affecting Caribbean financial services and tax systems, backed by the threat of blacklists and other penalties, while often applying more accommodating standards within their own membership.
The pattern is familiar. Large states possess greater capacity to shape international norms and stronger means of enforcing compliance. Small states must therefore balance the legitimate defence of their sovereignty against the practical consequences that powerful countries can impose. Tourism advisories, tariffs, visa restrictions and financial sanctions are not theoretical possibilities. They are instruments that have been used before and remain available.
The lesson Antigua and Barbuda has chosen to draw is neither one of defiance for its own sake nor of submission for the sake of convenience. It is the lesson of principled and transparent engagement. States are equal in law, but not in power. That disparity cannot simply be wished away.
What small states can do, and what Antigua and Barbuda has sought to do, is negotiate with a full understanding of its rights, define clearly the limits beyond which it will not go, place its decisions before its own people and legislature, and insist upon reciprocity as a condition of cooperation.
The true measure of friendship between sovereign states is not whether one country always says “yes” to another. It is whether each respects the legitimate interests and genuine constraints of the other. Cooperation should never require a small state to assume another country’s burden without appropriate safeguards, adequate financial support and clear accountability. Where those conditions exist, cooperation is not only possible; it is desirable.
For small states, transparency strengthens sovereignty. For larger states, respect strengthens partnership. Only where both are present can genuine cooperation endure.