Guyana News

-urges ministry intervention The Guyana Postal and Telecommunication Workers Union (GPTWU) has voiced its disapproval over the recent actions by the Rusal owned Bauxite Company of Guyana Inc (BCGI) and is calling on the Labour Ministry to intervene to protect the rights of workers.

When negotiations between GuySuCo and GAWU over the payment of the corporation’s Annual Production Incentive (API) continue tomorrow, the union will continue to press for a nine-day pay incentive for its workers.

The Canadian High Commission will be closed for the holidays on Christmas day, Monday December 28 and New Year’s Day.

Former Attorney-General and Minister of Legal Affairs Doodnauth Singh was yesterday hospitalized after complaining of feeling unwell.

Housing and Water Minister Irfaan Ali yesterday publicly acknowledged the ministry’s responsibility to ensure water flows to fire hydrants but he says that the work will have to involve other responsible agencies.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Senate Democrats moved closer yesterday to passing landmark healthcare legislation by Christmas after scoring a win in the first big test vote and gaining the support of a powerful lobbying group for doctors.

RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) – The Brazilian Supreme Court’s top judge delayed until today a ruling on whether a 9-year-old boy at the centre of an international custody battle will be reunited with his father and return to the United States.

Fire, which may have been caused by a laptop computer left on a bed, destroyed a section of a newly constructed house in Linden on Sunday night, leaving two brothers counting their losses.

BOGOTA (Reuters) – Colombia yesterday dismissed Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s charges that drones flying from Colombia are spying on him, with a senior official saying Venezuelan troops instead may have seen “Father Christmas’ sleigh.”

To be able to spend Christmas at home is what 11-year-old Nathasia Lindie hopes for after being cooped up in hospital for three months recuperating from second degree burns.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The 85-year-old son of the late New York socialite Brooke Astor was sentenced to at least one year in prison yesterday for looting his mother’s estate of money that had been set aside for charity.

Acting Chief Magistrate Melissa Robertson has ordered a mental examination for a 27-year-old barber, who said that he is God and that he is willing to marry 14-year-old girl that he is accused of carnally knowing; he was also remanded to prison.

A couple was yesterday remanded to prison after they appeared before Magistrate Hazel Octave-Hamilton charged jointly with possession of ammunition and possession of firearm without being the holders of licences.

TEHRAN – Opponents of Iran’s most senior dissident cleric Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri stopped his memorial service in a tumultuous day in Qom yesterday which saw huge protests and some shots fired, websites said.

-relatives of bar fracas victims urge police Police have said that the off duty cop who fatally shot Hewley Nicholas Barker and injured another man early Saturday morning was attacked by two men who pulled guns but family members are refuting this and are calling on the police to produce the guns they said the men had.

Even as residents on the Essequibo River islands of Wakenaam and Leguan hold out that the construction of airstrips will be of no real benefit to them, plans for the projects are going ahead as the bidding process for Wakenaam has begun.

The 2006 grisly murder of four persons including two children at Grove, East Bank Demerara (EBD) still has relatives and investigators baffled but the whereabouts of a female suspect is key to solving this case.

A 36-year-old father of two, of Diamond Squatting Area, East Bank Demerara was yesterday morning electrocuted while attempting to connect several wires close to a trench.

Seventeen students who recently graduated from the Art Williams and Harry Wendt Aeronautical Engi-neering School were urged to boost their qualifications in order to become more marketable in the sector.

Venezuela is to now receive the first shipment of paddy, under a US18.8M deal, after Christmas.