Leader of the Op­po­si­tion, Pen­ne­lope Beck­les re­ceived a cour­tesy call from Her Ex­cel­len­cy Dr. Lin­da Sobeh Ali, Am­bas­sador of the State of Pales­tine to Trinidad and To­ba­go, on Fri­day at the Of­fice of the Leader of the Op­po­si­tion.

Beck­les was joined by Leader of Op­po­si­tion Busi­ness in the Sen­ate, Sen­a­tor Dr Amery Browne, Op­po­si­tion Chief Whip, Mar­vin Gon­za­les, and Sen­a­tor Vish­nu Dhan­paul.

Dur­ing the meet­ing, Beck­les ex­pressed ap­pre­ci­a­tion for the am­bas­sador’s vis­it and reaf­firmed the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment’s long­stand­ing recog­ni­tion of the State of Pales­tine and its peo­ple.

Am­bas­sador Ali was pre­sent­ed with a steel­pan lapel pin, a sym­bol­ic rep­re­sen­ta­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s na­tion­al in­stru­ment, and a copy of The Il­lus­trat­ed Sto­ry of Pan by Kim John­son.

The dis­cus­sions re­flect­ed on Trinidad and To­ba­go’s his­to­ry of sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Pales­tin­ian peo­ple and sup­port for a two-state so­lu­tion as a path­way to last­ing peace.

Beck­les high­light­ed the coun­try’s for­mal recog­ni­tion of the State of Pales­tine on 2nd May 2024, a move that placed Trinidad and To­ba­go among 147 na­tions world­wide recog­nis­ing Pales­tin­ian state­hood. Diplo­mat­ic re­la­tions be­tween the two na­tions were for­mal­ly es­tab­lished on 22nd Sep­tem­ber 2024.

The Op­po­si­tion Leader al­so con­grat­u­lat­ed Am­bas­sador Ali on her pre­sen­ta­tion of cre­den­tials to Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo on Thurs­day 4th Sep­tem­ber 2025.

Both sides ex­pressed a com­mit­ment to strength­en­ing bi­lat­er­al ties, deep­en­ing di­a­logue, and ad­vanc­ing co­op­er­a­tion be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go and the State of Pales­tine.

Beck­les reaf­firmed the Op­po­si­tion’s po­si­tion that Pales­tine must con­tin­ue to be recog­nised as a sov­er­eign na­tion, guid­ed by prin­ci­ples of jus­tice, equal­i­ty, and hu­man dig­ni­ty.