evidence: Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro on Tuesday called for a bill to create a "Guyana Esequiba" province and ordered Venezuelan companies to prepare to enter the territory to explore for fossil fuels and minerals "immediately". The move escalated tensions over the disputed oil-rich territory. [...] However, Guyana, of which Essequibo makes up more than two-thirds and hosts 125,000 of its 800,000 citizens, has administered the territory since the frontiers were determined by an arbitration panel in 1899. [...] However, Maduro proposed at Tuesday’s government meeting that a bill be sent to the National Assembly for the creation of a "Guyana Esequiba" province.