07 September, 2006 - Published 22:04 GMT

US: the Caribbean is important

American officials say they're committed to meeting with their Caribbean colleagues to discuss concerns about their relationship.

This comes in response to concerns that the Caribbean was slipping off Washington's international relations priority list.

The Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Patrick Manning charged last week that Washington had been neglecting security and other issues in the region.

He said the this was a direct result of the Bush administration concentrating on fighting international terrorism.

Mr Manning also said the US was no longer interested in stopping the transhipment of drugs through the Caribbean.

"We are seeing a heightened use of Caribbean countries as transhipment centres, as drugs move from producing countries of the south, to the consuming countries of the north, Canada, US and Western Europe."

But on Thursday at a Caribbean conference in Port of Spain on energy, security and competitiveness, the US set out to allay those fears.

Karen Harbert the Assistant Secretary in the U.S. Department of Energy sought to give assurances that her government has not abandoned the region.

"It is not a relationship of dependency but a relationship of common pursuit to address the challenges faced in these smaller economies." she said.

Prime Minister Manning had also said that since the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001, the Bush administration was "studiously ignoring" the requirements of Trinidad and Tobago and the Caribbean.

He had also called on Washington to step up its assistance to the region in fighting the drugs trade.

One Trinidad and Tobago political commentator has told BBC Caribbean that if Port of Spain and the rest of the region were no longer a priority for the US, Mr Manning was partly to blame.

Dr Morgan Job, a former economics lecturer at the University of the West Indies, said Mr Manning's policy of "cozying up" to Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez and Cuban leader Fidel Castro - arch political enemies of the US - had not endeared him to Washington.