Regional News

(Barbados Nation) Dame Olga Lopes-Seale brought hope in deeds and words to thousands of Barbadians over six decades.

(Trinidad Express) For the first time since the 1990 coup attempt, a heavily armed contingent of soldiers were on Tuesday called upon to defend the Parliament.

(Jamaica Gleaner) Jamaica achieved another milestone in its telecommunications industry with the landing in St Ann on Monday of a 240-km undersea fibre-optic cable between the island and Cuba.

LAGO AGRIO, Ecuador (Reuters) – A court in Ecuador’s Amazon jungle has ordered Chevron to pay $8 billion in a closely-watched environmental lawsuit, but the US oil company rejected the ruling as “illegitimate”.

TAMPA, Florida (Jamaica Observer) – Alexander Johnson, the government informant who Reggae star Buju Banton claims entrapped him, took the witness stand yesterday but a juror fell ill, forcing an adjournment.

TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) – Fourteen people, including three Americans, were killed when a small plane crashed close to the Honduran capital Tegucigalpa, authorities said yesterday.

(Barbados Nation) They are scaling down their fleet, but the British Royal Navy will still have a presence in the Caribbean.

WASHINGTON,  (Reuters) – The World Bank and  International Monetary Fund are warning poor regions that have  so far not been hit by rising food prices, like sub-Saharan  Africa and the Caribbean, to get ready to face them.

OVALLE, Chile,  (Reuters) – A long drought has dried  up hydroelectric power production in Chile, sending electricity  costs soaring and making renewable power sources like wind,  solar and geothermal more attractive, particularly to  energy-hungry miners reaping a copper windfall.

(Jamaica Gleaner) Solicitor General Douglas Leys has now contradicted statements made by Prime Minister Bruce Golding that Jamaica was being stonewalled by the United States government for nearly a month after their request for the extradition of Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke.

(Jamaica Gleaner) Catalina Botero, special rapporteur on freedom of expression with the Organisation of American States (OAS), is backing calls by the local media for Jamaica’s libel laws to be relaxed much more than now proposed by political representatives.

LIMA, (Reuters) – Brazilian construction firms are  the biggest donors to Peruvian presidential front-runner  Alejandro Toledo, official documents show, at a time when Peru  is building billions of dollars in roads, ports and dams.

(BBC) A Scottish newspaper is reporting that controversy is being stirred between Scotland and Trinidad and Tobago by an advertisement mocking Scotsmen in kilts in a bid to lure Trinidadian drinkers from Scotch back to rum.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, (Reuters) – Several hundred  protesters clashed with riot police in Haiti’s capital yesterday to demand that outgoing President Rene Preval leave  office immediately as the country moved toward a deciding  presidential run-off vote.

JIS: Archival materials belonging to Jamaica’s late Ambassador of Culture The Honourable Louise Bennett-Coverley (Miss Lou), will be turned over to McMaster University, located in Hamilton, Canada.

(Trinidad Express) Julie Browne, the deputy spy chief who made the politically explosive recommendation to appoint her very junior technician, Reshmi Usha Ramnarine, 22 rungs up the agency ladder was asked to do so, a source with knowledge of the situation has said.

(Trinidad Express) In a strange twist of events on Friday, a 32-year-old Diego Martin man, who police on Sunday described as a “known pest”, was shot and killed by a man who he (the deceased) went to kill.

(BBC) The Prime Minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines appears to be turning up the heat on Trinidad and Tobago, the richest member of the Caribbean Community (Caricom).

MOSCOW, (Reuters) – For 15 million years, an icebound  lake has remained sealed deep beneath Antarctica’s frozen crust,  possibly hiding prehistoric or unknown life.

RIO DE JANEIRO, (Reuters) – Brazil may intensify  quality inspections of imported products in an effort to stem a  flood of Chinese goods that local industries say are weakening  them, the O Globo newspaper reported yesterday.