Category Archives: International

5th Summit of the Americas News: April 15, 2009

The Fifth Summit of the Americas in pictures

The Fifth Summit of the Americas in pictures

Manning opens ‘People’s Summit’
PRIME Minister Patrick Manning yesterday declared open the Fifth Summit of the Americas which he dubbed, “the People’s Summit”, as he launched the Civil Society Forum onboard the cruise ship, Caribbean Victory, which is docked in Port-of-Spain.

Panday still waiting for Summit invitation

UN Secretary General comes to PoS
A SURPRISE high-profile celebrity has been added to Prime Minister Patrick Manning’s guest list for the Summit of the Americas. He is United Nations (UN) Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
Continue reading 5th Summit of the Americas News: April 15, 2009

5th Summit of the Americas News: April 14, 2009

The Fifth Summit of the Americas in pictures

The Fifth Summit of the Americas in pictures

Mariano: Everything’s on track
Chairman of the Inter-Ministerial Committee, Mariano Browne, says “everything is on track for a good summit.”

Manning pleased as big opening day draws near

Obama talks at summit opening
United States President Barack Obama will speak “live” in Trinidad on Friday at the Opening Ceremony of the Fifth Summit of the Americas at the Hyatt Regency Hotel, said Prime Minister Patrick Manning.
Continue reading 5th Summit of the Americas News: April 14, 2009

Assessing Manning’s Ill-Conceived Summit-Related Latin American Safari

By Stephen Kangal
April 13, 2009

Egoism Gone Mad

PM Patrick ManningFor the host of the Fifth Summit of the Americas to decide to travel to 6 out of 33 Latin American countries with leftist leaning Presidents within a short period of four days using a most expensive private jet merely to ascertain the perspectives of these heads of state on the summit agenda of energy security and the Cuban question is nothing short of egoism gone mad.
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5th Summit of the Americas News: April 13, 2009

The Fifth Summit of the Americas in Photos

The Fifth Summit of the Americas in pictures

Chavez holds own talks: Nations meet in V’zuela
Three days before the Fifth Summit of the Americas, scheduled for April 17-19, a group of Latin American and Caribbean leaders led by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez will meet in Caracas to discuss new paths for regional integration, trade and cooperation.

Much conflict and contradiction
Questions were being raised about the alleged breaking of the rules, the outright refusal to be governed by the rules, about the refusal of the UDeCOTT leadership to submit to ministerial oversight.
Continue reading 5th Summit of the Americas News: April 13, 2009

Sober suggestions for summit war on drugs

By Raffique Shah
Sunday, April 12th 2009

Fifth Summit of the AmericasONE agenda item that no doubt crops up at every Summit of the Americas is the illegal drug trade. The two main mind-altering drugs produced, traded and used in the Western Hemisphere are marijuana and cocaine. Note-I have not mentioned alcohol, which is also mind-altering but which has been legalised globally. At the Fifth Summit, many leaders will slosh down the finest liquors taxpayers’ money can buy. Some of them will get embarrassingly drunk-as happened at recent top-level international conferences.
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Let’s get U S-Cuba relations straight

Dr. Kwame Nantambu
April 11, 2009

Raul Castro and Barack ObamaThe purpose of this article is to set the record straight in regard to the Cuban issue at the Fifth Summit of the Americas that is scheduled for April 17-19 in Trinidad.

Indeed, the record shows that Fidel Castro came to power through armed revolution on the 1st January 1959. He overthrew General Fulgencio Batista.

On 3rd January 1961, President Dwight Eisenhower severed diplomatic ties with Cuba.
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We have come a long way, Barack

By Raffique Shah
Sunday, April 5th 2009

Fifth Summit of the AmericasFOR those charged with securing the Summit delegates from rampaging protestors, as happened at last week’s G20 meeting in London, their bigger challenge is likely to be refereeing jousts among the delegates. Our people are not known for violent protests. In my youthful days I was involved in some of the biggest protest demonstrations that followed the Black Power eruption of 1970. Among them was the infamous “Bloody Tuesday” on March 18, 1975, which, by the time it was violently attacked by the police on Coffee Street, San Fernando, had grown in size to more than 5,000 people-and expanding by the minute. The violence, when it came, was on orders from Dennis Ramdwar, not from the demonstrators.
Continue reading We have come a long way, Barack

Summit for neglected majority

By Raffique Shah
Sunday, March 29th 2009

Fifth Summit of the AmericasLet us forget for a moment the “spring cleaning” exercise the Government has undertaken in preparation for the Fifth Summit of the Americas. True, we all tend to put our best faces forward when we invite visitors to our homes. But one cannot live in an unholy dump year-round and clean up only for Christmas or for visitors-it’s stupid. Trinidadians, more so than Tobagonians, have descended into a kind of nastiness that is difficult to understand.
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Food pact from Summit

By Raffique Shah
Sunday, March 22nd 2009

Fifth Summit of the AmericasI understand and can excuse the average citizen’s call for Government to cancel hosting the Fifth Summit of the Americas (SOA), and later this year, the Commonwealth Heads’ (CHOGM) meeting. After all, most ordinary people will have noted these conferences mere months ago, when Government alluded to them, to their costs, and what the country hoped to gain by hosting half of the world’s heads of governments (when both meetings are combined). The man-in-the-street would think Prime Minister Patrick Manning awoke one morning last year, and while still in a daze, took the billion-dollar decision up St Ann’s way.
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The Catholic Church and the Underdevelopment of Africa

By Michael De Gale
March 19, 2009

The Christian BibleIn light of the devastating effect that AIDS is having on the continent of Africa, it is unconscionable that Pope Benedict XVI should condemn the use of condoms as a way to reduce the spread of HIV and AIDS. In a recent visit to the continent where 22 million people are living with the disease, Pope Benedict XVI stated that, “condoms are not the answer to the AIDS epidemic in Africa and can make the problem worse”. This begs the question, “How many more of Africa’s sons and daughters must suffer and die before this hood wearing demon places human life ahead of religious dogma?” Indeed, contraception is not the panacea that would put an end to this scourge, but it will do much to curb the alarming rate of infection.
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