NEWS

Fake cops held in San Juan, guns, car seized

Three men described by police as “known offenders” are in custody after they were caught wearing tactical police gear. One of the men is believed to be a retired police officer who worked in the Northeastern Division. Police said they received reports of the men being in the area at around 3.30 am. Members of the Northeastern Division Emergency Response Patrol and the San Juan CID went to Silver Mill, where they found and arrested the three men, two of whom were wearing police uniforms. Read more here

Two teenage girls missing

Po­lice are seek­ing the ur­gent as­sis­tance of the pub­lic in lo­cat­ing 16-year-old Kay­la Parey and 15-year-old Sarah Ali. Parey is a ward of the St. Jude’s School for Girls, Bel­mont Cir­cu­lar Road, Port of Spain. She was last seen at the SER­VOL Life Cen­tre School, around 11:00 am on Tues­day 29th Oc­to­ber 2019. She was re­port­ed miss­ing to the Bel­mont Po­lice Sta­tion around 3:55pm on the same date. Parey is of African de­scent, 5 feet, 6 inch­es tall, 160lbs, slim built, with an afro hair­style, and a dark brown com­plex­ion. She was last seen wear­ing her SER­VOL Life Cen­tre school uni­form - cream shirt and brown pleat­ed skirt. Read more here

POLITICS

UNC has no right

Planning Minister Camille Robinson-Regis said the Opposition UNC has no right to ask about fired sports minister Darryl Smith and the government’s sexual harassment policy since the former PP government had crafted any such document and also, PP government officials acted badly when facing their own sexual harassment claims. She spoke at a PNM rally at Exodus Pan Yard, Tunapuna on Tuesday night. The government is now resisting calls to publish the report of the probe into the payment of a $150,000 settlement to Smith’s former aide, claiming it is unusable as Smith was not interviewed, two claims the Opposition rejects. Robinson-Regis said, “Keep quiet about Darryl Smith. Their track record is less than stellar.” She said under the PP a woman filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against an official, but suddenly dropped it. “Mysteriously she was given a house and the case never went forward.” Read more here

PM all but cleared in Miami bank account scandal

Pre­lim­i­nary find­ings by the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) have all but cleared Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley of any wrong­do­ing in re­la­tion to al­le­ga­tions of fi­nan­cial im­pro­pri­ety. Dur­ing his con­tri­bu­tion to the bud­get de­bate on Oc­to­ber 9, 2018, Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Mooni­lal said he vis­it­ed bank­ing in­sti­tu­tions in Mi­a­mi where he re­tained emails and doc­u­ments which re­vealed Row­ley re­ceived funds from the A&V Drilling fake oil scan­dal. He called out bank­ing ac­count num­bers and named Dr Row­ley and for­mer Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) can­di­date for Siparia, Vidya De­ok­iesingh. At yes­ter­day’s week­ly po­lice me­dia brief­ing, Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith said when the mat­ter was brought to its at­ten­tion the TTPS launched an in­ves­ti­ga­tion. Read more here

BUSINESS

UN a force for global peace and stability

In his inaugural speech on the day he was officially appointed president of the 74th United Nations General Assembly, Prof Tijjani Muhammad-Bande reminded his colleagues that the world looks up to the United Nations. “We must never forget that… (the UN) is a veritable vehicle for attaining peace and security, sustainable development and universal human rights.” It’s his goal then to use his office to “give privilege” to the UN’s primary concerns – global peace and security – as he advocates for the implementation of core elements of the organisation’s sustainable development goals (SDGs), including the number one and number two targets, poverty eradication and zero hunger. He’s also tackling education, inclusion and climate action. Read more here

Sorrel as you’ve never seen it: think pink

From a single seed, Sharon Rosella Roopsingh is growing her dream – pink sorrel that she’s turned into a thriving business. Four years ago, she and her husband, Renison, bought a tin of seeds. And from those seeds grew one pink plant. The unusual colour caught Roopsingh’s attention. (Incidentally, her middle name is also a variation of sorrel -- it's the name the fruit, a variety of hibiscus, goes by in Australia.) "When my husband and I first saw it, it looked like the fruit (sorrel) on the tree was spoilt.” But they left it alone and eventually realised that’s just how the fruit was. “We found it unusual and exotic and we went with it." Read more here

REGIONAL

Don Wanted Heads - Prosecutors Release Details Of Confessions In Grisly Killings As Three Plead Guilty To Non-Capital Murder

A don gave the orders for a St Catherine woman and her teenage daughter to be decapitated because they were viewed as informers, according to the video-recorded confessions of three of the men convicted for the grisly crime. Transcripts of the confessions were released by prosecutors yesterday after Fabian Smith, Adrian Campbell, and Rushane Goldson pleaded guilty to non-capital murder just before they were set to go on trial in the Home Circuit Court for the 2011 double killing that triggered national outrage. Read more here

First crude cargo by February

Guyana’s Crude Lifting Agreement (CLA) is expected to be completed in the coming week even as the country is working towards its first lifting of crude by late February or March 2020. At a news conference on Wednesday hosted at the National Communications Network (NCN), Director of the Department of Energy (DoE), Dr. Mark Bynoe, said that crude will be sold – more or less – at a million barrels per lift. By the time the country is producing at a peak of 120 barrels of oil per day, a new lift would be anticipated every 8 to 10 days. Should ‘first oil’ be possible in December, Guyana would not lift its first volume of crude until one month after. Dr. Bynoe also explained that the first entitlement of crude will go to ExxonMobil. Read more here

INTERNATIONAL

The 'Giuliani factor' that might condemn Trump to impeachment

Rudy Giuliani's fingerprints are everywhere. Despite being invisible for days after shelving his train wreck TV interviews he is emerging with President Donald Trump as the most dominant and intriguing figure in the impeachment drama. The man once feted as America's mayor is looming over events on Capitol Hill as details of his expansive role in the scandal fill publicly released witness testimony. "He was always swirling around somewhere," US Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland testified, adding that Giuliani's shadow foreign policy mission in Ukraine got more "insidious" as time went on. Read more here

Bosco Ntaganda sentenced to 30 years for crimes in DR Congo

A former Congolese rebel leader has been sentenced to 30 years for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Bosco Ntaganda, nicknamed "Terminator", was convicted on 18 counts including murder, rape, sexual slavery and using child soldiers. Judges at the International Criminal Court (ICC) found in July that fighters loyal to Ntaganda had carried out gruesome massacres of civilians. The sentence is the longest the ICC has handed down. Read more here

7th November 2019

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