Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath has dis­missed sug­ges­tions that Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s warmer tone to­wards Venezuela is dri­ven by Trinidad and To­ba­go’s in­ter­est in the coun­try’s en­er­gy re­sources.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les is de­fend­ing her cor­dial in­ter­ac­tion with Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar af­ter the two were seen hold­ing hands at the cer­e­mo­ni­al open­ing of the 2026-2027 law term on Wednes­day.

As Trinidad and To­ba­go joins the world in mark­ing 25 years since the Sep­tem­ber 11 ter­ror­ist at­tacks in the Unit­ed States, a lead­ing lo­cal Mus­lim or­gan­i­sa­tion is re­new­ing its call for the Gov­ern­ment to re­verse its des­ig­na­tion of Hamas, Hezbol­lah and Iran’s Is­lam­ic Rev­o­lu­tion­ary Guard Corps (IRGC) as ter­ror­ist en­ti­ties.

The Na­tion­al Pro­gramme for the Up­keep of Pub­lic Spaces (NPUPS) will come to an end on Sep­tem­ber 13, with Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Khadi­jah Ameen say­ing the pro­gramme could re­sume and be ex­pand­ed de­pend­ing on fund­ing al­lo­cat­ed in the 2027 Na­tion­al Bud­get.

Par­ents whose ap­pli­ca­tions for the Ed­u­ca­tion Min­istry’s 2026 school sup­plies and book grants have been ap­proved are ex­pect­ed to re­ceive the grants by Sep­tem­ber 21, Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Michael Dowlath said yes­ter­day.

Sau­di Ara­bia said Fri­day it shut down a ma­jor pipeline a day af­ter it was at­tacked by drones, and Yemen’s Iran­ian-backed Houthi rebels cap­tured a strate­gic is­land at the south­ern en­trance to the Red Sea, two of­fi­cials said, open­ing a new front in the Iran war.

The Trinidad and To­ba­go gov­ern­ment Fri­day said that a new Na­tion­al Com­mit­tee on Repa­ra­tions will be ap­point­ed in “due course”.

Cit­i­zens and lawyers seek­ing to pur­sue ap­peals be­fore the Unit­ed King­dom-based Privy Coun­cil will no longer have to pay fees for visas to at­tend hear­ings. 

For­mer pres­i­dent of the An­ju­man Sun­nat ul Ja­maat As­so­ci­a­tion (AS­JA), Dr Man­soor Ibrahim, has died.

The Ebo­la out­break in Con­go, the world’s fastest-grow­ing out­break of the dis­ease on record, has now spread to sev­en provinces in the African coun­try, lo­cal au­thor­i­ties said. And it’s show­ing no signs of slow­ing down.

Sev­er­al dozen pres­i­den­tial brief­ing doc­u­ments de­clas­si­fied Fri­day, the 25th an­niver­sary of the Sept. 11 at­tacks, de­tail in­tel­li­gence gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials had gath­ered about Osama bin Laden and al-Qai­da lead­ing up to the hi­jack­ings that killed near­ly 3,000 peo­ple and up­end­ed Amer­i­can na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty.

Amer­i­cans com­mem­o­rat­ed the 25th an­niver­sary of 9/11 on Fri­day, re­mem­ber­ing the shock, the dead and the sweep­ing con­se­quences of the al-Qai­da at­tacks on sym­bols of U.S. might and pros­per­i­ty.