News

The U.S. Department of State will no longer add visa pages into U.S.

JEDDAH, (Reuters) – The world’s largest Muslim body backed Saudi Arabia in its weeks-long diplomatic spat with Iran in a statement issued on Thursday night, accusing Tehran of backing terrorism and meddling in other countries’ affairs.

(Trinidad Guardian) Slaughter of the innocents. That was how Laventille residents yesterday described the double murder of two schoolboys, who were dragged from a taxi and shot dead while on their way home at Upper Picton Road.

By Shabna Rahman and Pushpa Balgobin Scores of sugar workers yesterday demonstrated in front of Public Buildings, protesting the planned closure of the Wales Sugar Estate while expressing skepticism at government’s statements that plans are in the pipeline to cushion the impact of the shuttering of the operations.

The government last evening used its parliamentary majority to supress an opposition motion seeking to have all Members of the National Assembly make public their tax returns to the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) over the last 10 years, while arguing that such a move would violate privacy.

Clarence Carter, the Linden man who allegedly killed his wife, stabbed her daughter and then tried to take his own life, was charged with murder and remanded to prison yesterday.

A Plaisance hairdresser died early yesterday morning when she crashed into a fence along the Goedverwagting Railway Embankment, East Coast Demerara.

Speaker of the National Assembly Barton Scotland yesterday ruled against a request by opposition Member of Parliament and trade unionist Komal Chand for an urgent debate on government’s decision to close the Wales sugar estate.

The bodies of three more Guyanese were reported to have been found in Venezuelan waters after a tragic boating accident on Sunday, bringing the death toll to seven.

A Mahaica farmer was yesterday killed in an early morning accident when he was struck by a speeding car while riding his bicycle along the Hand-en-Veldt Public Road.

BUJUMBURA, (Reuters) – Two former Burundi presidents pleaded for the United Nations Security Council yesterday to back the deployment of international troops to the African state gripped by political violence because it “runs the risk of becoming another Rwanda” Diplomats of the 15-member council arrived in Burundi’s capital Bujumbura yesterday evening for its second visit to the tiny landlocked state in less than a year, where fears of an ethnic war have also led to an economic crisis.

Crime Chief Wendell Blanhum on Wednesday said police have arrested one of the suspects in the death of Akeem Culley, whose body was found in a North Sophia trench on Tuesday.

Dozens of tillage workers and planters at the Guyana Sugar Corporation’s (GuySuCo) Wales estate will be out of work immediately following the decision by government to close the West Demerara estate.

The Guyana Elections Commission (Gecom) has once again come in for criticism from the opposition People’s Progressive Party (PPP), which says the body has failed to release critical information for the upcoming local government elections.

MOSCOW, (Reuters) – The rouble maintained its slide through record lows yesterday, threatening more hardship for ordinary Russians and prompting some to stock up on dollars as the Kremlin denied the currency was collapsing.

The Ministry of Education’s Department of Culture, Youth and Sport has revealed some of the events planned for this year’s Mashramani celebrations, which will start this weekend.

MOSCOW, (Reuters) – Russia’s AIDS epidemic is at a dangerous tipping point after the number of people registered HIV-positive passed the 1 million mark, the country’s top AIDS specialist said yesterday, warning the rate of infection had reached record levels.

Only one passenger out of 19 in a recently monitored water taxi was wearing a life jacket and this has prompted the Maritime Administration Department (MARAD) to say it will continue to aggressively promote maritime safety.

OKLAHOMA CITY, (Reuters) – A former Oklahoma City police officer convicted of raping four women and sexually assaulting several others while he was on duty was sentenced yesterday to 263 consecutive years in prison, the maximum allowable sentence.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, (Reuters) – Haitian President Michel Martelly said a runoff election to choose the impoverished Caribbean nation’s next leader will take place on Sunday despite opposition protests, in a sign that talks to postpone the vote had failed.