NEWS

Slave trade damage needs repair

Has much changed with globalisation? How far has this country and the Caribbean come from being ruled by the colonial powers? These and other questions surrounding a contemporary Caribbean in a wider world were examined last week by scholars and lecturers at the University of the West Indies’ symposium “Capitalism and Slavery – 75 years later.” The two-day conference which took place on November 13 and 14, considered the ideas put forward by Dr Eric Williams in his book, Capitalism and Slavery, published in 1944, and the impact they have made. Read more here

Russian intelligence gathering ship visits T&T

A Russ­ian in­tel­li­gence-gath­er­ing ship Yan­tar (Am­ber) re­cent­ly en­tered T&T wa­ters. Un­like three pre­vi­ous vis­its in 2018 by an­oth­er Russ­ian ves­sel, the Vik­tor Leonov, which docked in Point Lisas in March and near the Hy­att Re­gency Port-of-Spain, in Jan­u­ary and Feb­ru­ary, the ship was an­chored out at sea from the Port of Port-of-Spain. The ship-track­ing site Marine­Traf­fic.com list­ed the Yan­tar ar­riv­ing at the Port-of- Spain port on No­vem­ber 8th at 4.19 pm and an­chor­ing six kilo­me­tres south-east of the Point Baleine light­house, one of the far­thest points among the ships that were an­chored far away from the pub­lic’s eyes. Read more here

Parts of Trinidad being battered by thunderstorms

Parts of south Trinidad are being battered at this time by flooding rainfall accompanied by damaging winds. On Monday afternoon, the meteorological office at Piarco had forecast fair to partly cloudy with the isolated showers nearing dawn. Read more here

POLITICS

Lakshmi Girls’ cops 40 schols, another President’s Medal

Lakshmi Girls Hindu College made it five in a row in this year’s Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) scholarship results, with student Celine Roodal winning one of the two President’s Medals yesterday. Roodal was the top performing student in environmental studies, information and communication technology, mathematics and natural science. Naparima Girls High School student Sharvaani Rampersad-Maharaj won the second President’s Medal as the top performing student in business studies, creative and performing studies, general studies, language studies, humanities and technical studies. Read more here

Rowley hoping for football revival

Prime MinisterDr Keith Rowley has recovered from his illness. Speaking at a function in Couva yesterday, Rowley said: “Today is one of those days where this job is all about feeling good and I do feel good. Read more here

BUSINESS

BP still working to fill gap in declines

BPTT’s re­gion­al pres­i­dent Claire Fitz­patrick has ex­pressed that BP is still work­ing on fill­ing the gap in gas pro­duc­tion af­ter its failed in­fill drilling pro­gramme ear­li­er this year. Speak­ing at BPTT’s tech­nol­o­gy open house Fitz­patrick said: “In terms of our de­clines, a lot of the work we are do­ing here is around mak­ing sure we can max­imise the pro­duc­tion.” Fitz­patrick said that whether max­imis­ing pro­duc­tion comes through the util­i­sa­tion of its new tech­nolo­gies, the com­pa­ny has an ob­jec­tive of en­sur­ing that it can meet its ex­ist­ing con­trac­tu­al com­mit­ments. Ref­er­enc­ing a pre­sen­ta­tion dur­ing the event, Fitz­patrick re­it­er­at­ed that gas de­clines quite quick­ly. Read more here

Pennywise thrives amidst challenges

Trinidad and Tobago is bleeding and hurting socially and the economy is flat or a little negative. Read more here

REGIONAL

Ganja ‘High’ Schools - Marijuana-Laced Cookies The Rave Among St James Students

Amid concerns of a permissive culture of drug use among Jamaican children, there are fresh fears that easy access to marijuana-laced foods is putting students at risk of health complications in ‘high schools’. Stakeholders in the western parish of St James are particularly worried that the consumption of ganja cookies and other marijuana-infused products could take hold. While school administrators were generally coy in response to reports of high-school students in St James getting ill after ingesting ganja cookies – cakes laced with ganja – several children with whom The Gleaner spoke have confirmed that the practice is growing. Read more here

Where is the sugar money?

The People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPPC) is still to give the nation an explanation for what actually became of the portion of the Euro166.67M ($34.4B) that was given to Guyana between 2006 and 2015, and was expected to go to programmes that mitigated the effects of the declining sugar industry. This is according to the People’s National Congress Reform, which is contending that under the PPP government, unemployment grew from 32,931 in 2002 to 34,964 in 2012. And with the PPPC and Leader of the Opposition Bharrat Jagdeo complaining about the lack of salary increases for sugar workers as was given to public servants, the PNCR is questioning whether that party ever had those workers’ interests at heart. Read more here

INTERNATIONAL

Impeachment inquiry enters most crucial stage with top witnesses on deck

 Democrats who want to oust President Donald Trump and Republicans battling to save him are braced for the most momentous phase yet in the battle of impeachment that is rocking Washington. The showdown that could result in Trump becoming only the third US president to suffer such a fate will resume in the House Intelligence Committee at 9 a.m. ET with appearances by senior national security officials. Dramatic televised hearings featuring what is expected to be occasionally stunning testimony over the next three days could decide whether Trump's accusers can establish that he abused his power to pressure Ukraine for political favors. Democrats have simplified their charge against the President -- arguing now that he may be guilty of the impeachable crime of bribery after holding up military aid for Ukraine. Read more here

US and Australian hostages 'freed in Taliban prisoner swap'

The Afghan Taliban have freed two Western hostages in exchange for three imprisoned senior militants, officials and Taliban sources say. American Kevin King and Australian Timothy Weeks were released three years after being kidnapped outside the American University of Afghanistan in Kabul where they worked as professors. The three militants arrived in Qatar from Afghanistan as part of the swap. Afghan officials say the deal is aimed at restarting talks with the Taliban. President Ashraf Ghani said last week the decision was "a tough, but important" one and a "humanitarian gesture". Read more here

19th November 2019

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