BRIDGETOWN, Barbados - For disaster management personnel, the challenge of preparing Caribbean communities is a great one. That is according to the outgoing Executive Director of the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA), Jeremy Collymore. His comments came during an interview with the media yesterday afternoon following a media conference and luncheon in his honour at the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre.
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BRUSSELS, CMC – Two Caribbean Community (CARICOM) nationals, including former Guyana president Bharrat Jagdeo, have been included in the 14-member Eminent Persons Group (EPG) whose mission will be to provide guidance and recommendations for the future of the African Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Grouping. Apart from 48-year-old Jagdeo, who served as President of Guyana from 1999 to 2011, the other CARICOM national on the EPG, is Jamaican-born Patricia Francis, the executive director of the International Trade Centre (ITC).
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados - Dave Cameron unseated Julian Hunte as West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) president yesterday and immediately promised lofty goals aimed at restoring the regional team to the top of world cricket. In a closely fought ballot at the regional governing body’s annual general meeting, the 42-year-old Cameron polled seven votes to Hunte’s five – a result that suggested there was a split of votes in at least one of the six territorial boards.
ST. GEORGE’S, Grenada, CMC – Grenada will hold a referendum in two years to decide on the island’s relationship with the Trinidad-based Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ), Governor General Sir Carlyle Glean said Wednesday.
Addressing the ceremonial opening of the new Parliament since the February 19 general elections, Sir Carlyle said that the Constitution Reform Committee would be reconstituted and given a two year mandate, with the CCJ among its top priorities.
KINGSTON, Jamaica - FOR decades the small developing states of the world, led by the advocacy of Caricom, have been at pains to explain to the world that their economies are very vulnerable to adverse external events, to which they have severely limited capacity for adjustment.
(Jamaica Observer) - A moderate earthquake has rattled Trinidad & Tobago, causing some alarm, but no reported damage or injuries.
The US Geological Survey says the magnitude-4.8 quake struck early yesterday and was centred some 50 miles north east of Roxborough, an eastern town on the tourism-dependent island of Tobago. It was also felt in the Caribbean country of Barbados.
Its epicentre was about 46 kilometres (29 miles) below the surface.
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – Journalist Anika Gumbs-Sandiford has retained former attorney general Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj as she pursues legal action against Sports Minister Anil Roberts for defamation.
“I have been advised by Senior Counsel that the words spoken and published amount to serious slander and libel and would entitle me to be vindicated by the court in respect to my character and reputation as an investigative journalist.
KINGSTON, Jamaica, CMC- Thirty-three Haitians were taken ashore on Saturday afternoon after they were intercepted by Coast Guard officials off the coast of the eastern parish of Portland.
The Haitians - 16 adult males, four adult females and 13 children including two infants were spotted by fishermen who alerted the marine police and the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF).
They were examined by a medical team and the Office Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) alerted.
NASSAU, Bahamas, CMC – Foreign Minister Frederick Mitchell says the Royal Bahamas Defence Force (RBDF) had detained 17 Cubans at Cay Lobos on Sunday and that the Perry Christie administration is seeking to repatriate them swiftly to Havana.
“We have advised the Cuban government that they are in the centre and we want them repatriated swiftly to Cuba in accordance with the provisions of our agreement with Cuba,” Mitchell said, adding that the Cubans, whom he did not give much information about, had been brought to the capital.
GRAND TURK, Turks and Caicos Islands, CMC– Immigration authorities here say they are investigating the escape of at least a dozen Cubans, who mysteriously arrived in Miami in what is believed to be a human trafficking ring. lara Gardiner, of the Turks and Caicos’ Ministry of Immigration and Border Control, confirmed that authorities are conducting the probe but did not know when the inquiry would be completed.